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This is vague - I apologize in advance, I am trying to be as succinct as I can with my limited understanding, while exposing my potentially incorrect assumptions.

I have a website that's literally one huge HTML file. It runs scripts defined in-line in a <scripts> tag.

My goal is to move all the scripts into individual .js files and pull them into index.html (or into one another where required). I am familiar with the usage of Node's require and I am familiar with import, as used in Angular. I stress usage because I don't really know how they work.

Assumption 1: I cannot use require - it is purely for Node.js. The reason I bring it up is that I am pretty sure I have seen require in AngularJS 1.5 code, so assuming makes me uncomfortable. I am guessing this was stitched together by WebPack, Gulp, or similar.

Assumption 2: I should use import, but import only works with a URL address, if I have my .js hosted on a server or CDN, it will be be pulled. BUT, I cannot give local pathing (on the server) here - index.html will NOT automatically pull in the dependencies while being served. I need npm/Webpack/other to pre-compile my index.html if I want the deps pulled in on the server.

Assumption 3: Pre-compiling into a single, ready-to-go, html file is the desired way to build things, because the file can be served quickly (assuming it's ready to go). I make the assumption with the recent trend of serving Markdown from CDNs, the appearance of the JAMstack, and the number of sites using Jekyll and such (though admittedly for traditional Jekyll sites).

Assumption 4: I also want to go to Typescript eventually, but I assume that changes nothing, since I will just pull in TS to compile it down to .js and then use whatever solution I used above

Question: If it's clear what I am trying to do and what confuses me, is a decent solution to look into npm/Webpack to stich together my .js files? What would prepare them for being stiched together, using import/export? If so, is there an example of how this is usually done?

VSO
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1 Answers1

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As you mentioned, require cannot be used for your purposes, since it is a part of CommonJS and NodeJS's module system. More info on require can be found here: What is this Javascript "require"?

Import is a ES2015 standard JS syntax. But ES2015 standard and everything above it has very limited browser support. You can read more about it here: Import Reference

However, you can still code in the latest standard (thereby enabling the use of import/export etc.,) and then transpile the code to be able to run on the browser. Inorder to do this, you require a transpiler. You can refer Babel which is one of the most popular transpilers : https://babeljs.io/

For your exact purpose, you need to use a module bundler. Webpack/Rollup etc., are some popular module bundlers. They can automatically identify all the JS files referenced through import, combine them and then transpile code to be able to run on the browser (they also use a transpiler) and produce a single JS file (or multiple, based on your configurations).

You can refer the getting started guides of Webpack: https://webpack.js.org/guides/getting-started/

or RollupJS: https://rollupjs.org/guide/en#quick-start

Pavish
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