Webpack Alternate Require Loader

This loader allows webpack to approximate arcane Node.js require semantics for advanced use cases when a normal require doesn't suffice

Background

The Problem

Let's say you have a project like:

src/index.js
src/outside-of-resolution-path/node_modules/foo

if you try:

// src/index.js
// BAD: Fails
var foo = require("foo");

This will fail, because src/outside-of-resolution-path/node_modules is not in the resolution path, which is:

src/node_modules
node_modules

The Module Pattern

One solution to this problem is called the "module pattern", which adds an extra file to start Node.js module resolution from a different directory. Basically, say we add a simple file in a directory outside of the current Node.js require resolution path:

// src/outside-of-resolution-path/require.js
// Re-export the `require` to start resolution from `src/outside-of-resolution-path/node_modules`
module.exports = require;

And switched our importing code to:

// src/index.js
// GOOD: Module pattern (re-exported `require`) works!
var foo = require("./outside-of-resolution-path/require")("foo");

this works because the Node.js resolution path starts from the re-exported require:

src/outside-of-resolution-path/node_modules
src/node_modules
node_modules

Webpack

The above pattern works just fine for Node.js. Unfortunately, this non-standard require usage fails in Webpack.

Enter this loader, which allows a bridge for webpack builds to also use the module pattern / other non-standard requires.

Installation

The loader is available via npm:

$ npm install --save webpack-alternate-require-loader

Usage

The plugin takes a configuration object of a re-exported module path to search for in code and then a resolved path to that same code on disk like:

{
  "CODE_TO_MATCH": require.resolve("REEXPORTED_CODE_PATH")
  "./outside-of-resolution-path/require": require.resolve("./outside-of-resolution-path/require")
}

It will then effectively transform something like:

var foo = require("CODE_TO_MATCH")("foo");
var foo = require("./outside-of-resolution-path/require")("foo");

to:

var foo = require("/RESOLVED/PATH/TO/foo");

This effectively simulates what Node.js would do at execution time to the code.

Examples

A basic configuration:

module.exports = {
  module: {
    loaders: [
      {
        test: /\.js$/,
        loader: "webpack-alternate-require-loader",
        query: JSON.stringify({
          "./outside-of-resolution-path/require": require.resolve("./outside-of-resolution-path/require")
        })
      }
    ]
  }
};

Additional examples are provided in: demo/webpack.config.js. If you have a clone of this repository with devDependencies, you can run:

$ npm run build-demo-wp

and see the results in the demo directory.

Notes

Do I have to use exactly the module / require pattern above?

Yes. Although Node.js can figure out:

var altRequire = require("./outside-of-resolution-path/require");
var foo = altRequire("foo");

This plugin currently cannot because it is naive and uses regexes. You must follow the form:

var foo = require("./outside-of-resolution-path/require")("foo");

Fortunately, if you are using babel-plugin-replace-require, you can easily produce require expressions that work with this plugin.

Why can't I just prepend the non-standard node_modules path in code?

See the module pattern discussion page. Basically, with top-level dependencies you can. But with nested dependencies and modern npm / yarn the real depended on code can be located anywhere in the tree. And you need the node_modules search path to be different than normal.

You're using regexes? Yuck!

Indeed. But that's basically how webpack / some loaders roll. We stick to an easy pattern and avoid the cost of a full babel install + parsing. But, we may be open to real code parsing in the future.

Contributions

Contributions welcome! Make sure to pass $ npm run check.