reunion

Bring your javascript files together. In a peaceful way.

STOP

• Writing massive, single file jquery plugins
• Writing the same (function(window) { })(window); closure around everything
• Worrying about supporting all those other loaders and strange systems
• Thinking that there is no other way!

START

• Using multiple files for your javascript projects
• Realizing that your source files don't have to be your distributed files
• Use simple common.js require syntax since you wanted a single file anyway
• Making it easier to maintain your javascript code.
• No setup required. No package.json required
• Saying NO to poor client side organization in your repos and start using reunion today!

install

Node users:

npm install reunion -g

Ruby folks:

gem install reunion

cli

Using reunion is the simplest thing you will do. ever.

reunion /path/to/your/client/lib.js > /path/to/your/client/dist/lib.js

That's it! Reunion will output to stdout your lib.js as well as include any local "dependencies" found through your "require" calls.

commonjs requires in 2 seconds

Basic Premise: Files are modules. module.exports exposes what you want to share.

foo.js (main project file)

// set local variable bar to the "module" bar.js (no extension needed)
// this variable can be called anything (usually similar to the string modulename for sanity)
var bar = require('./bar');

// we can now access anything in bar we exported
bar.say();
bar.my_constant;

// by default, the module.exports is an empty object {}
// you can override it with any other valid js type (object, function, string, etc...)
module.exports = function() {
    return bar.say() + bar.my_constant;
};

// since we don't export this, this variable is private to the file (our "module")
var private;

bar.js (lives next to foo.js)

// if your require a directory
// the resolver will look for an index.js file and load that as the "module"
var baz = require('./foobar');

// this is the same thing as above
var baz = require('./foobar/index');

module.exports.say = function() {
    ...
};

module.exports.my_constant = 42;

index.js (in a folder called foobar next to foo.js)

var Cat = function() {};

Cat.prototype = ...

module.exports = Cat;

examples

Take a look at the following projects which I have ported to use reunion. Look at how much easier the code is to read, follow, and maintain!

• jquery-qrcode
• bintrees

Try porting over some of your small projects/client side libs! Super simple. If you want help porting, just ask :)

makefile magic

Add the following snippets of code to your makefile to build your distribution files.

# `make dist` to package for distribution, deps do the rest
dist: dist/awesome_lib.min.js

# assuming your main source file lives at `awesome_lib.js` in the project root
dist/awesome_lib.js: awesome_lib.js
    reunion --ns awesome_lib $< > $@

# minification courtesy of googlz
dist/awesome_lib.min.js: dist/awesome_lib.js
    url --data-urlencode "js_code@$<" \
        -d "output_info=compiled_code&compilation_level=SIMPLE_OPTIMIZATIONS" \
        http://closure-compiler.appspot.com/compile > $@

advanced

Users making more extensive use of npm modules for their client side development should check out the following projects:

• script
• browserify