I'm a beginner using NodeJS. I'm using a plugin for video-js called videojs-playlist. The docs say to include it like this:
<script src="path/to/video.js/dist/video.js"></script>
<script src="path/to/videojs-playlist/dist/videojs-playlist.js"></script>
What exactly is the path/to supposed to be if not root/node_modules or something like that? How am I supposed to access those files from an ejs view? I have installed both video-js and videojs-playlist using npm.
Right now I get redirect errors on my page because it's not finding the file from the paths I've tried.
If the path doesn't have a / at the beginning, then the path is relative to the file the <script> tag is in; otherwise, it is relative to the site root -- which may mean different things depending on if/how you are bundling/deploying your javascript.
For a simple case, if you have the script tags in an index.html, and you copied video.js to the same directory as index.html, you would reference by:
<script src="video.js">
If you are using Node to test things out on your personal machine, you could reference a file relative to your HTML file and node_modules directory; however, this wouldn't really be the best in the context of deploying and managing a real application.
Node gives you require() to import modules from dependencies you've installed without needing to specify their exact location and directory structure, but it looks like this particular plugin may not have given you that convenience here.
It looks like you are in need of a bundler. One widely-used and well-documented bundler is webpack, but there are others such as parcel and FuseBox. These can all serve your needs.
These tools are most likely what the videojs-playlist README on GitHub is referring to when they say:
Include videojs-playlist on your website using the tool(s) of your choice.
Among other features, these tools can take a file from one of your node_modules dependencies, and "bundle" relative your javascript application (however you desire), so that you don't have to carry around some pre-installed giant node_modules directory everywhere with you -- you only take what you need with you and structure it the way you want.
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I am playing with a node application, which is running a basic hello-world HTML page.
I want to use isomerjs, which I installed via npm - though I imagine this question is more general than this one particular module. I do see it in the node_modules directory.
I'm not sure where to point my <script src="/path/to/isomer.min.js"></script> at. The module directory appears to only have the uncompiled files.
What is the accepted or standard way of utilizing front-end code from a node module? Am I missing a step?
I use npm as a package manager for my web frontend projects. I have a need to generate some fake data locally within JavaScript in a project. Faker.js seems to be the perfect library to do so.
Most libraries, when I install them with npm, either have usable js files at the root of the installed files or provide a dist or similar folder with the .js files that I can reference, e.g. <script src="node_modules/angular/angular.min.js"></script> Faker.js however does not include this.
The documentation for faker simply includes this line: <script src = "faker.js" type = "text/javascript"></script> Clearly this will not work since the package doesn't even install a file called faker.js anywhere. My assumption is that you're expected to either use it with Node.js (non web frontend) projects or you're expected to build it somehow to get the faker.js file.
One tutorial I found online says you can npm install faker and then use <script src="node_modules/faker/build/build/faker.js">. But I also do not have a build folder. The tutorial didn't give any instructions on building the faker.js file.
Can someone shed some light on how this works? I have actually seen at least one other package (jQuery) that is similar and does not include a compiled usable browser version in the distribution. In past projects I've simply downloaded a compiled .js file and included it in my source control, but I'd like to try to avoid that if at all possible!
(Please don't answer with "just use a CDN" - I am working in an environment with specific policy requirements that HTML on the production server may not directly reference any off-site assets or scripts, but it is OK to pull in those libraries and self-host them. Frustrating, yes, but I don't get to make the rules.)
Node/NPM newbie with a front-end dev question. I understand one of the strengths of an NPM-type module is that its dependencies get installed within itself, in node_modules. Modules always have the code that they need, and outside libs don't conflict.
That said, seems like this would result in the client downloading the same lib+ver (say, jquery v.X) multiple times. What's the technique for specifying that a module needs a dependency but that it shouldn't package that code if the dependency is already available on the site/page? Does said technique involve parent modules that make the shared lib+ver available?
Or, should various front-end modules just re-download the same lib+ver that other modules on the page might have already downloaded?
The client will only grab files from that folder that are needed, so if it's linked in HTML once the client will only grab it once. NPM handles dependency duplicates automatically.
Having said that, normally you will want to only serve a static folder to the client without revealing your entire server structure. This can be achieved using:
app.use(express.static('server/public')
where 'server/public' is the directory relative to the server.js file that you want to serve. In this case, 'public' contains all my linked view files, stylesheets, JS files, etc. that are linked from the HTML pages. You don't need to move that module's dependencies there as well.
The downside to this is that you'd have to manually move dependencies into the public folder (I make a 'vendor' directory usually) and link from there. It's more work but it's much more efficient and safer in the long run.
NOTE: when using a static folder to serve files, your HTML links will be served from a relative path to that folder.
I have the same problem that has already been documented on GitHub here. ui-tinymce references a number of dependencies which cannot be reached in my application.
GET http://localhost:8080/jspm_packages/github/tinymce/tinymce-dist#4.3.12/themes/modern/theme.min.js # angular.js:6084
tinymce.js:9426 Failed to load: /jspm_packages/github/tinymce/tinymce-dist#4.3.12/themes/modern/theme.min.js
I am able to use the workaround suggested in the github issue above, which changes the baseURL. This works fine in my development environment. However, when I run jspm bundle-sfx it does not pick up these dependencies and I am left in the same situation without templates or plugins.
What is the best way to address this? Can angular-ui-tinymce be broken down so that the dependent files are available in separate packages? Or should I just use gulp to get around this problem?
I tried using Gulp to concatenate the missing files, however this will not work because by default tinymce still expects the files to be at the relative locations which it uses in its own internal file structure.
I still think it would be helpful for Tinymce to provide separate packages for the most common themes, however I admit that there are a lot of themes and plugins so this would be a fair amount of work.
In the end the simplest thing to was to copy the theme and plugin files into the "correct" relative directories within my own source code. This way I can change the relative baseURL for tinymce and it will be correct when I run it in production as well as development environments.
This way I can run jspm bundle-sfx and it will bundle these files along with everything else. However you may have to import the files explicitly if you do not serve the area statically in your application. For example:
import 'sysadmin/app/tinymce/themes/modern/theme';
I'm building an app that will contain many js (jquery) modules (files) using the following setup;
The build is run using Grunt task runner.
I use handlebars templates, then generate the html from *.hbs files.
During the build, I uglify all the js files into one minified file.
I call the minified file in my application <script src="assets/js/app.min.js"></script>
Now, I want to use requirejs to organize my code and adhere to the AMD specifications..
But I got 3 problems with this approach:
I need to have 1 single minified file for all the js; this keeps my code harder to "decode" thus to copy (since it is mixed with other dependencies; jquery, modernizer..) and also helps avoid extra http requests if scripts are called individually.. However, requirejs needs a main file to initialize the app and inside that main file It calls the other required files.. I don't have such configuration.
Many of the dependencies I'm using are in a bower package (that I don't include in the distribution); this makes it not possible to call those files using the suggested requirejs method.
I'm using jquery on this with some 3rd party plugins that don't call define(); to make them work I have to use shim config which again rises the problem #2!
So how am I supposed to take advantage of requirejs while keeping my code in modules and well organized?
Sorry for the long question and thanks for reading :)
ps: Feel free to change the title of the question as I couldn't find a better one!
I finally opted for AngularJS as it adheres to my setup above and allows me to split my app into manageable small modules.
I have also the possibility to use the ease of jQuery (even though it is not a best practice among angular community) and much more.