🔗 console-link

Effortlessly stream client-side console.log messages to your server-side terminal via WebSocket. Debugging across environments has never been easier!
This is just a proof of concept and intended only for development purposes. Works only on localhost.

🚀 Features

• Global override – Redirect all console methods (e.g., console.log, console.error) to the terminal without modifying your code.
• Multiple integration options – Choose from three simple methods to integrate.
• Real-time streaming – Logs are instantly sent from the client to the server.
• Queueing – Ensures no logs are lost, even if the WebSocket connection isn't ready.

🛠️ Installation

npm install -g console-link

📖 Usage

In the terminal:

console-link
# Or run directly without preinstallation
npx console-link

On the client-side (choose one):

1. Node.js (e.g., React)

import 'console-link';

// Now all console messages will be forwarded to the server.

2. HTML

<script src="https://www.unpkg.com/console-link"></script>

3. Paste in DevTools

Simply copy the distributed code (available at https://www.unpkg.com/console-link) and paste it into your browser's DevTools console.

⚙️ Port Customization

Need to configure a specific port for your WebSocket server? Start by specifying the port directly when running the command:

console-link [PORT_NUMBER]

Replace [PORT_NUMBER] with any available port you need. For example:

console-link 2137

This starts the WebSocket server on port 2137. If you'd like to set a custom port interactively on the client side, simply use console-link/prompt instead of console-link. For example:

import 'console-link/prompt';

or include it in your HTML:

<script src="https://www.unpkg.com/console-link/dist/prompt.js"></script>

Note: Make sure to use the full URL (https://www.unpkg.com/console-link/dist/prompt.js) as the shorter link (https://www.unpkg.com/console-link/prompt) doesn't work.

🧠 How It Works

1. The command in the terminal starts a WebSocket server.
2. The client-side script establishes a WebSocket connection to the server and overrides window.console using a Proxy.
3. Logs are serialized using flatted to handle circular references.
4. The server listens for incoming messages and prints them to the terminal.

✨ Example

Client

console.log('App started');
console.warn('Something might be wrong');
console.error('An error occurred');

Terminal Output

> console-link is running on ws://localhost:5001
> console-link client connected
App started
Something might be wrong
An error occurred
> console-link client disconnected