How do you use meteor packages ? about meteor-webpack-react

[grigio]

./met add aPackage
And you have it globally exposed

[vjau]

Thank you, but i guess there is no way atm to require it (like universe:modules does), to make the typescript compiler happy ?

[grigio]

There is a bug open about typescript, basically you import or require npm modules where you need or you install packages a la Meteor way and you use the function globally exposed

[vjau]

Ok, thanks.

[AdamBrodzinski]

@vjau as far as making the typescript compiler happy... could you have a file called packages.js and then do something like this?

// packages.js
export const Meteor = Meteor;
export const SimpleSchema = SimpleSchema;
export const FlowRouter = FlowRouter;


// somewhere else

import FlowRouter from '../../packages/FlowRouter';
// or with an alias
import FlowRouter from 'packages/FlowRouter';

[vjau]

@AdamBrodzinski : actually, the idiomatic way to do that in Typescript when the variables are global and comes from a js (= not TS) file, is to use some "ambient" declarations in a d.ts file.
The question about "requiring" the meteor packages was more about the better scope control this would have given over "everything in global" import.
However i guess we will have to wait for MDG to provide a proper solution, hoping they will make the most compatible (not too meteorish...) choice.
I wonder if it would be doable to write a meteor package loader for webpack, that would somehow transpile (build) the files in the package in a single ES6 module that would have the correct exports.

[AdamBrodzinski]

@vjau ah I see! thanks for clearing that up!

I wonder if it would be doable to write a meteor package loader for webpack, that would somehow transpile (build) the files in the package in a single ES6 module that would have the correct exports.

Perhaps but since MDG will do this eventually it's easier to just leave them global and use a few packages as possible and require NPM modules when available (like Moment or Ramda, etc..)

Have you had a look at the typescript PR yet? Have you been able to get hot loading to work with TS? This PR adds support for manual compiling and the 2nd commit includes a loader but no hot loading:
#43

[vjau]

Actually, my tsx files are transpiled by Atom to jsx, i don't use the webback typescript loader.
Sometimes i have to reload the page so that it updates correctly, but i don't think this is typescript related, since for all webbpack knows, it's a regular jsx project.

[AdamBrodzinski]

Ah gotcha. That's how the the PR author did it as well... built to dist/ and required the js from dist.

Off topic but have you used Facebook's Flow yet? It looks interesting and I was thinking about using it since it's fairly easy to integrate into current projects.

[vjau]

I have tried flow, but i gave up since it doesn't support source files with unicode and won't for sometime.
Also webstorm doesn't support it atm and should not support it either in next version. It's still pretty experimental.
I think atm that Typescript has a stronger momentum.
Eventually, i guess (hope) we will have type support in ES8, and that we won't need those sideprojects anymore.

[jedwards1211]

My goal for this project isn't to provide a require alternative for using meteor packages...just to be able to use it in my own code and avoid the meteor ecosystem as much as possible. If you want to use Meteor packages with this, best use them the Meteor way. I don't have time to experiment with doing anything like rocket:module or universe:modules does, but I'd be happy to accept PRs!