gulp-tron

Easy-to-use, configuration-driven build manager for Gulp projects.

• Simple task creation through configuration
• Fluent API for manipulating build streams
• Dependency management for task execution
• Automatic generation of @clean and @watch tasks
• BrowserSync integration for watch workflows
• Plugin support for extending and reusing build processes

Installation

You can use any package manager of your choice. Here are some examples:

bun add -d gulp gulp-tron
# or
npm i --save-dev gulp gulp-tron
# or
pnpm add -D gulp gulp-tron
# or
yarn add -D gulp gulp-tron

gulp is a peer dependency and should be installed alongside gulp-tron.

Quick example

import tron from "gulp-tron";

const scripts = {
  name: "scripts",
  src: "src/**/*.js",
  dest: "dist/js",
  build: (bs) => bs.src().pipe(/* plugin */).dest(),
};

const build = {
  name: "@build",
  triggers: tron.parallel(scripts),
  clean: "dist",
};

tron.task(scripts);
tron.task(build).addCleaner().addWatcher();

You can inspect the generated task list with:

npx gulp --tasks

Output:

Tasks for ./gulpfile.js
├── scripts
├── @build
├── @clean
└── @watch

Core concepts

Tron

The tron instance manages tasks and builds dependency trees.

import tron from "gulp-tron";

tron.task({
  name: "build",
  src: "src/**/*.js",
  dest: "dist",
  build: (bs) => bs.src().dest(),
});

TaskConfig

A task is generally described as a TaskConfig object:

const conf = {
  name: "scripts",
  src: "src/**/*.js",
  dest: "dist/js",
  build: (bs) => bs.src().dest(),
  dependsOn: ["shared"],
  triggers: ["notify"],
};

BuildStream

A BuildStream instance is created for each task execution and provides fluent API such as:

• src() / add() / remove() / filter()
• rename() / order() / changed()
• copy() / del() / clean() / exec()
• dest() / reload() / debug() / pipe()

API overview

Tron methods

• task() — register a task by config or name
• createTasks() — register multiple tasks
• addCleaner() — create an auto-generated @clean task
• addWatcher() — create an auto-generated @watch task
• series() / parallel() — build task groups
• selectTasks() / selectTasksAll() / findTask() — task lookup helpers

BuildStream methods

• src(), add(), remove(), filter(), rename(), order()
• changed(), copy(), del(), clean(), exec()
• dest(), reload(), clear(), clone()
• promise(), chain(), pipe(), debug(), through()
• sync(), finish(), log()

Cleaner and watcher patterns

tron
  .task({
    name: "styles",
    src: "src/**/*.scss",
    dest: "dist/css",
    build: (bs) => bs.src().pipe(/* sass plugin */).dest(),
    clean: "dist/css",
    watch: "src/**/*.scss",
  })
  .addCleaner()
  .addWatcher({
    browserSync: { server: "dist" },
  });

This creates:

• styles task
• @clean task from the task's clean property
• @watch task from the task's watch or src property

Related docs

• Getting Started
• Tron API
• BuildStream API
• Types Reference

License

MIT