zen-typescript-starter-project

Modern and minimalist TypeScript front end starter project using ES6 modules with optional bundling. Fully customizable.

You might not need an advanced set up like create-react-app even if you are using React, this project is for people who:

• Want to use only what is needed and have total control over their development
• Don't have to support legacy browsers and resent having the bloat and cruft force fed to them
• Enjoy fine tuning their own development environment without having to worry about a one-way eject option or insanely complex webpack scripts.

Tooling

This starter project uses the best and most minimal tools to make development a delight.

Uses ESlint, typescript-eslint / eslint-config-prettier for linting.

Uses Mocha with jsdom and Node.js's built in strict assert for tests.

Uses rollup.js and rollup-plugin-closure-compiler for optional bundling and minification if required.

Usage

Installation

git clone https://github.com/David-Else/zen-typescript-starter-project

npm install or pnpm/yarn install

Run NPM Scripts.

Use the NPM scripts via the Visual Studio Code interface or command line.

Typical use might be run 'start-typescript-development' to start compilation, testing, and linting. This will continuously convert all newly edited TypeScript files to .js files in the same directory. Use the recommended Visual Studio Code settings below to make the compiled .js files invisible in the editor.

Live Preview

Run your development server of choice to start the live preview in the browser.

To use ES6 Module imports for live browser preview AND TypeScript compilation you must import files with the .js extension:

import Example from './classes/example.js';

TypeScript resolves the types from the .ts file, and you get browser compatibility. It is a bit of a workaround which is discussed here: microsoft/TypeScript#16577

Testing

Mocha is run using --require esm --require ./test/setup-jsdom.js, so ES6 Modules work out of the box, and all jsdom settings can be edited in the setup-jsdom.js file.

The tests are run on the compiled .js files, so make sure you are running in TSC watch mode or you might find yourself running old versions of the tests.

Bundling

Run the 'build-bundle' script and rollup.js and closure compiler will create your bundle automatically in the dist directory. You can change the file references to point to the dist directory in index.html, they are provided in commented out form.

Closure compiler is set by default to SIMPLE mode in the rollup.config.js, and an ES6 Module is created rather than an IIFE, so don't forget to import it as a module or it may fail or you will loose the advantage of strict mode.

Closure compiler also has ADVANCED mode which can be set by:

compilation_level: 'ADVANCED',

but it will most likely require you to re-write parts of your code and is considered an advanced topic. It will create the smallest bundle sizes known to humanity if you want to try it.

The zen-typescript-starter-project bundling facilities are the most basic and important, tree shaking and minification. If you want to expand on that then you can edit rollup.config.js and install additional extensions as needed.

Recommended Visual Studio Code extensions

esbenp.prettier-vscode ritwickdey.liveserver

Recommended Visual Studio Code settings.json

  // Typescript, stop compiled .js and .map files showing in explorer
  "files.exclude": {
    "**/*.js": { "when": "$(basename).ts" },
    "**/*.js.map": true
  },

Additional Anti-bloat Recommendations

pnpm - Fast, disk space efficient package manager

pika - Find modern packages on npm. Get faster, smaller JavaScript bundles