title | layout | stylesheet |
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TypeScript |
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The TypeScript rules integrate the TypeScript compiler with Bazel.
This package provides Bazel wrappers around the TypeScript compiler.
At a high level, there are two alternatives provided: ts_project
and ts_library
.
This section describes the trade-offs between these rules.
ts_project
simply runs tsc --project
, with Bazel knowing which outputs to expect based on the TypeScript compiler options, and with interoperability with other TypeScript rules via a Bazel Provider (DeclarationInfo) that transmits the type information.
It is intended as an easy on-boarding for existing TypeScript code and should be familiar if your background is in frontend ecosystem idioms.
Any behavior of ts_project
should be reproducible outside of Bazel, with a couple of caveats noted in the rule documentation below.
We used to recommend using the
tsc
rule directly from thetypescript
project, likeload("@npm//typescript:index.bzl", "tsc")
Howeverts_project
is strictly better and should be used instead.
ts_library
is an open-sourced version of the rule we use to compile TS code at Google.
It should be familiar if your background is in Bazel idioms.
It is very complex, involving code generation of the tsconfig.json
file, a custom compiler binary, and a lot of extra features.
It is also opinionated, and may not work with existing TypeScript code. For example:
- Your TS code must compile under the
--declaration
flag so that downstream libraries depend only on types, not implementation. This makes Bazel faster by avoiding cascading rebuilds in cases where the types aren't changed. - We control the output format and module syntax so that downstream rules can rely on them.
On the other hand, ts_library
is also fast and optimized.
We keep a running TypeScript compile running as a daemon, using Bazel workers.
This process avoids re-parse and re-JIT of the >1MB typescript.js
and keeps cached bound ASTs for input files which saves time.
We also produce JS code which can be loaded faster (using named AMD module format) and which can be consumed by the Closure Compiler (via integration with tsickle).
Add a devDependency on @bazel/typescript
$ yarn add -D @bazel/typescript
# or
$ npm install --save-dev @bazel/typescript
Watch for any peerDependency warnings - we assume you have already installed the typescript
package from npm.
Your WORKSPACE
should declare a yarn_install
or npm_install
rule named npm
.
It should then install the rules found in the npm packages using the install_bazel_dependencies
function.
See https://github.com/bazelbuild/rules_nodejs/#quickstart
Add to your WORKSPACE
file, after install_bazel_dependencies()
:
# Set up TypeScript toolchain
load("@npm_bazel_typescript//:index.bzl", "ts_setup_workspace")
ts_setup_workspace()
Create a BUILD.bazel
file in your workspace root. If your tsconfig.json
file is in the root, use
exports_files(["tsconfig.json"], visibility = ["//visibility:public"])
otherwise create an alias:
alias(
name = "tsconfig.json",
actual = "//path/to/my:tsconfig.json",
)
Make sure to remove the --noEmit
compiler option from your tsconfig.json
. This is not compatible with the ts_library
rule.
We recommend you use Bazel managed dependencies but if you would like
Bazel to also install a node_modules
in your workspace you can also
point the node_repositories
repository rule in your WORKSPACE file to
your package.json
.
node_repositories(package_json = ["//:package.json"])
You can then run yarn
in your workspace with:
$ bazel run @nodejs//:yarn_node_repositories
To use your workspace node_modules
folder as a dependency in ts_library
and
other rules, add the following to your root BUILD.bazel
file:
filegroup(
name = "node_modules",
srcs = glob(
include = [
"node_modules/**/*.js",
"node_modules/**/*.d.ts",
"node_modules/**/*.json",
"node_modules/.bin/*",
],
exclude = [
# Files under test & docs may contain file names that
# are not legal Bazel labels (e.g.,
# node_modules/ecstatic/test/public/中文/檔案.html)
"node_modules/**/test/**",
"node_modules/**/docs/**",
# Files with spaces in the name are not legal Bazel labels
"node_modules/**/* */**",
"node_modules/**/* *",
],
),
)
# Create a tsc_wrapped compiler rule to use in the ts_library
# compiler attribute when using self-managed dependencies
nodejs_binary(
name = "@bazel/typescript/tsc_wrapped",
entry_point = "@bazel/typescript/internal/tsc_wrapped/tsc_wrapped.js",
# Point bazel to your node_modules to find the entry point
node_modules = ["//:node_modules"],
)
See https://github.com/bazelbuild/rules_nodejs#dependencies for more information on managing npm dependencies with Bazel.
An example use case is needing to increase the NodeJS heap size used for compilations.
Similar to above, you declare your own binary for running tsc_wrapped, e.g.:
nodejs_binary(
name = "tsc_wrapped_bin",
entry_point = "@npm//:node_modules/@bazel/typescript/internal/tsc_wrapped/tsc_wrapped.js",
templated_args = [
"--node_options=--max-old-space-size=2048",
],
data = [
"@npm//protobufjs",
"@npm//source-map-support",
"@npm//tsutils",
"@npm//typescript",
"@npm//@bazel/typescript",
],
)
then refer to that target in the compiler
attribute of your ts_library
rule.
Note that nodejs_binary
targets generated by npm_install
/yarn_install
can include data dependencies
on packages which aren't declared as dependencies. For example, if you use [tsickle] to generate Closure Compiler-compatible JS, then it needs to be a data
dependency of tsc_wrapped
so that it can be loaded at runtime.

[tsickle]: https://github.com/angular/tsickle
The ts_library
rule invokes the TypeScript compiler on one compilation unit,
or "library" (generally one directory of source files).
Create a BUILD
file next to your sources:
package(default_visibility=["//visibility:public"])
load("@npm_bazel_typescript//:index.bzl", "ts_library")
ts_library(
name = "my_code",
srcs = glob(["*.ts"]),
deps = ["//path/to/other:library"],
)
If your ts_library target has npm dependencies you can specify these
with fine grained npm dependency targets created by the yarn_install
or
npm_install
rules:
ts_library(
name = "my_code",
srcs = glob(["*.ts"]),
deps = [
"@npm//@types/node",
"@npm//@types/foo",
"@npm//foo",
"//path/to/other:library",
],
)
You can also use the @npm//@types
target which will include all
packages in the @types
scope as dependencies.
If you are using self-managed npm dependencies, you can use the
node_modules
attribute in ts_library
and point it to the
//:node_modules
filegroup defined in your root BUILD.bazel
file.
You'll also need to override the compiler
attribute if you do this
as the Bazel-managed deps and self-managed cannot be used together
in the same rule.
ts_library(
name = "my_code",
srcs = glob(["*.ts"]),
deps = ["//path/to/other:library"],
node_modules = "//:node_modules",
compiler = "//:@bazel/typescript/tsc_wrapped",
)
To build a ts_library
target run:
bazel build //path/to/package:target
The resulting .d.ts
file paths will be printed. Additionally, the .js
outputs from TypeScript will be written to disk, next to the .d.ts
files 1.
Note that the tsconfig.json
file used for compilation should be the same one
your editor references, to keep consistent settings for the TypeScript compiler.
By default, ts_library
uses the tsconfig.json
file in the workspace root
directory. See the notes about the tsconfig
attribute in the ts_library API docs.
1 The declarationDir compiler option will be silently overwritten if present.
The default output of the ts_library
rule is the .d.ts
files.
This is for a couple reasons:
- help ensure that downstream rules which access default outputs will not require a cascading re-build when only the implementation changes but not the types
- make you think about whether you want the devmode (named UMD) or prodmode outputs
You can access the JS output by adding a filegroup
rule after the ts_library
,
for example
ts_library(
name = "compile",
srcs = ["thing.ts"],
)
filegroup(
name = "thing.js",
srcs = ["compile"],
# Change to es6_sources to get the 'prodmode' JS
output_group = "es5_sources",
)
my_rule(
name = "uses_js",
deps = ["thing.js"],
)
There are two choices for development mode:
- Use the
ts_devserver
rule to bring up our simple, fast development server. This is intentionally very simple, to help you get started quickly. However, since there are many development servers available, we do not want to mirror their features in yet another server we maintain. - Teach your real frontend server to serve files from Bazel's output directory.
This is not yet documented. Choose this option if you have an existing server
used in development mode, or if your requirements exceed what the
ts_devserver
supports. Be careful that your development round-trip stays fast (should be under two seconds).
To use ts_devserver
, you simply load
the rule, and call it with deps
that
point to your ts_library
target(s):
load("@npm_bazel_typescript//:index.bzl", "ts_devserver", "ts_library")
ts_library(
name = "app",
srcs = ["app.ts"],
)
ts_devserver(
name = "devserver",
# We'll collect all the devmode JS sources from these TypeScript libraries
deps = [":app"],
# This is the path we'll request from the browser, see index.html
serving_path = "/bundle.js",
# The devserver can serve our static files too
static_files = ["index.html"],
)
The index.html
should be the same one you use for production, and it should
load the JavaScript bundle from the path indicated in serving_path
.
If you don't have an index.html file, a simple one will be generated by the
ts_devserver
.
See examples/app
in this repository for a working example. To run the
devserver, we recommend you use ibazel:
$ ibazel run examples/app:devserver
ibazel
will keep the devserver program running, and provides a LiveReload
server so the browser refreshes the application automatically when each build
finishes.
Bazel's TypeScript compiler has your workspace path mapped, so you can import from an absolute path starting from your workspace.
/WORKSPACE
:
workspace(name = "myworkspace")
/some/long/path/to/deeply/nested/subdirectory.ts
:
import {thing} from 'myworkspace/place';
will import from /place.ts
.
Since this is an extension to the vanilla TypeScript compiler, editors which use the TypeScript language services to provide code completion and inline type checking will not be able to resolve the modules. In the above example, adding
"paths": {
"myworkspace/*": ["*"]
}
to tsconfig.json
will fix the imports for the common case of using absolute paths.
See path mapping for more details on the paths syntax.
Similarly, you can use path mapping to teach the editor how to resolve imports
from ts_library
rules which set the module_name
attribute.
If you'd like a "watch mode", try ibazel.
At some point, we plan to release a tool similar to gazelle to generate the BUILD files from your source code.
Allows a tsconfig.json file to extend another file.
Normally, you just give a single tsconfig.json
file as the tsconfig attribute
of a ts_library
rule. However, if your tsconfig.json
uses the extends
feature from TypeScript, then the Bazel implementation needs to know about that
extended configuration file as well, to pass them both to the TypeScript compiler.
ts_config(name, deps, src)
(name, mandatory): A unique name for this target.
(labels, mandatory): Additional tsconfig.json files referenced via extends
(label, mandatory): The tsconfig.json file passed to the TypeScript compiler
ts_devserver is a simple development server intended for a quick "getting started" experience.
Additional documentation at https://github.com/alexeagle/angular-bazel-example/wiki/Running-a-devserver-under-Bazel
ts_devserver(name, additional_root_paths, bootstrap, deps, devserver, devserver_host, entry_module, port, scripts, serving_path, static_files)
(name, mandatory): A unique name for this target.
(List of strings): Additional root paths to serve static_files
from.
Paths should include the workspace name such as ["__main__/resources"]
Defaults to []
(labels): Scripts to include in the JS bundle before the module loader (require.js)
Defaults to []
(labels): Targets that produce JavaScript, such as ts_library
Defaults to []
(label): Go based devserver executable.
With cross-platform RBE for OSX & Windows ctx.executable.devserver will be linux as --cpu and
--host_cpu must be overridden to k8. However, we still want to be able to run the devserver on the host
machine so we need to include the host devserver binary, which is ctx.executable.devserver_host, in the
runfiles. For non-RBE and for RBE with a linux host, ctx.executable.devserver & ctx.executable.devserver_host
will be the same binary.
Defaults to precompiled go binary in @npm_bazel_typescript setup by @bazel/typescript npm package
Defaults to //devserver:devserver
(label): Go based devserver executable for the host platform. Defaults to precompiled go binary in @npm_bazel_typescript setup by @bazel/typescript npm package
Defaults to //devserver:devserver_darwin_amd64
(String): The entry_module
should be the AMD module name of the entry module such as "__main__/src/index".
ts_devserver
concats the following snippet after the bundle to load the application:
require(["entry_module"]);
Defaults to ""
(Integer): The port that the devserver will listen on.
Defaults to 5432
(labels): User scripts to include in the JS bundle before the application sources
Defaults to []
(String): The path you can request from the client HTML which serves the JavaScript bundle. If you don't specify one, the JavaScript can be loaded at /_/ts_scripts.js
Defaults to "/_/ts_scripts.js"
(labels): Arbitrary files which to be served, such as index.html. They are served relative to the package where this rule is declared.
Defaults to []
ts_library
type-checks and compiles a set of TypeScript sources to JavaScript.
It produces declarations files (.d.ts
) which are used for compiling downstream
TypeScript targets and JavaScript for the browser and Closure compiler.
ts_library(name, angular_assets, compiler, data, deps, devmode_module, devmode_target, expected_diagnostics, generate_externs, internal_testing_type_check_dependencies, module_name, module_root, node_modules, prodmode_module, prodmode_target, runtime, runtime_deps, srcs, supports_workers, tsconfig, tsickle_typed, use_angular_plugin)
(name, mandatory): A unique name for this target.
(labels): Additional files the Angular compiler will need to read as inputs. Includes .css and .html files
Defaults to []
(label): Sets a different TypeScript compiler binary to use for this library.
For example, we use the vanilla TypeScript tsc.js for bootstrapping,
and Angular compilations can replace this with ngc
.
The default ts_library compiler depends on the @npm//@bazel/typescript
target which is setup for projects that use bazel managed npm deps that
fetch the @bazel/typescript npm package. It is recommended that you use
the workspace name @npm
for bazel managed deps so the default
compiler works out of the box. Otherwise, you'll have to override
the compiler attribute manually.
Defaults to @build_bazel_rules_typescript//internal:tsc_wrapped_bin
(labels)
Defaults to []
(labels): Compile-time dependencies, typically other ts_library targets
Defaults to []
(String): Set the typescript module
compiler option for devmode output.
This value will override the module
option in the user supplied tsconfig.
Defaults to "umd"
(String): Set the typescript target
compiler option for devmode output.
This value will override the target
option in the user supplied tsconfig.
Defaults to "es2015"
(List of strings)
Defaults to []
(Boolean)
Defaults to True
(Boolean): Testing only, whether to type check inputs that aren't srcs.
Defaults to False
(String)
Defaults to ""
(String)
Defaults to ""
(label): The npm packages which should be available during the compile.
The default value is @npm//typescript:typescript__typings
is setup
for projects that use bazel managed npm deps that. It is recommended
that you use the workspace name @npm
for bazel managed deps so the
default node_modules works out of the box. Otherwise, you'll have to
override the node_modules attribute manually. This default is in place
since ts_library will always depend on at least the typescript
default libs which are provided by @npm//typescript:typescript__typings
.
This attribute is DEPRECATED. As of version 0.18.0 the recommended
approach to npm dependencies is to use fine grained npm dependencies
which are setup with the yarn_install
or npm_install
rules.
For example, in targets that used a //:node_modules
filegroup,
ts_library(
name = "my_lib",
...
node_modules = "//:node_modules",
)
which specifies all files within the //:node_modules
filegroup
to be inputs to the my_lib
. Using fine grained npm dependencies,
my_lib
is defined with only the npm dependencies that are
needed:
ts_library(
name = "my_lib",
...
deps = [
"@npm//@types/foo",
"@npm//@types/bar",
"@npm//foo",
"@npm//bar",
...
],
)
In this case, only the listed npm packages and their
transitive deps are includes as inputs to the my_lib
target
which reduces the time required to setup the runfiles for this
target (see bazelbuild/bazel#5153).
The default typescript libs are also available via the node_modules
default in this case.
The @npm external repository and the fine grained npm package
targets are setup using the yarn_install
or npm_install
rule
in your WORKSPACE file:
yarn_install(
name = "npm",
package_json = "//:package.json",
yarn_lock = "//:yarn.lock",
)
Defaults to @npm//typescript:typescript__typings
(String): Set the typescript module
compiler option for prodmode output.
This value will override the module
option in the user supplied tsconfig.
Defaults to "esnext"
(String): Set the typescript target
compiler option for prodmode output.
This value will override the target
option in the user supplied tsconfig.
Defaults to "es2015"
(String)
Defaults to "browser"
(labels)
Defaults to []
(labels, mandatory): The TypeScript source files to compile.
(Boolean): Intended for internal use only.
Allows you to disable the Bazel Worker strategy for this library. Typically used together with the "compiler" setting when using a non-worker aware compiler binary.
Defaults to True
(label): A tsconfig.json file containing settings for TypeScript compilation.
Note that some properties in the tsconfig are governed by Bazel and will be
overridden, such as target
and module
.
The default value is set to //:tsconfig.json
by a macro. This means you must
either:
- Have your
tsconfig.json
file in the workspace root directory - Use an alias in the root BUILD.bazel file to point to the location of tsconfig:
alias(name="tsconfig.json", actual="//path/to:tsconfig-something.json")
- Give an explicit
tsconfig
attribute to allts_library
targets
Defaults to None
(Boolean): If using tsickle, instruct it to translate types to ClosureJS format
Defaults to True
(Boolean): Run the Angular ngtsc compiler under ts_library
Defaults to False
Compiles one TypeScript project using tsc --project
This is a drop-in replacement for the tsc
rule automatically generated for the "typescript"
package, typically loaded from @npm//typescript:index.bzl
. Unlike bare tsc
, this rule understands
the Bazel interop mechanism (Providers) so that this rule works with others that produce or consume
TypeScript typings (.d.ts
files).
Unlike ts_library
, this rule is the thinnest possible layer of Bazel interoperability on top
of the TypeScript compiler. It shifts the burden of configuring TypeScript into the tsconfig.json file.
See https://github.com/bazelbuild/rules_nodejs/blob/master/docs/TypeScript.md#alternatives
for more details about the trade-offs between the two rules.
Some TypeScript options affect which files are emitted, and Bazel wants to know these ahead-of-time. So several options from the tsconfig file must be mirrored as attributes to ts_project. See https://www.typescriptlang.org/v2/en/tsconfig for a listing of the TypeScript options.
Any code that works with tsc
should work with ts_project
with a few caveats:
- Bazel requires that the
outDir
(anddeclarationDir
) be set tobazel-out/[target architecture]/bin/path/to/package
so we override whatever settings appear in your tsconfig. - Bazel expects that each output is produced by a single rule.
Thus if you have two
ts_project
rules with overlapping sources (the same.ts
file appears in more than one) then you get an error about conflicting.js
output files if you try to build both together. Worse, if you build them separately then the output directory will contain whichever one you happened to build most recently. This is highly discouraged.
Note: in order for TypeScript to resolve relative references to the bazel-out folder, we recommend that the base tsconfig contain a rootDirs section that includes all possible locations they may appear.
We hope this will not be needed in some future release of TypeScript. Follow microsoft/TypeScript#37257 for more info.
For example, if the base tsconfig file relative to the workspace root is
path/to/tsconfig.json
then you should configure like:"compilerOptions": { "rootDirs": [ ".", "../../bazel-out/darwin-fastbuild/bin/path/to", "../../bazel-out/k8-fastbuild/bin/path/to", "../../bazel-out/x64_windows-fastbuild/bin/path/to", "../../bazel-out/darwin-dbg/bin/path/to", "../../bazel-out/k8-dbg/bin/path/to", "../../bazel-out/x64_windows-dbg/bin/path/to", ] }
When using a non-sandboxed spawn strategy (which is the default on Windows), you may observe these problems which require workarounds:
-
Bazel deletes outputs from the previous execution before running
tsc
. This causes a problem with TypeScript's incremental mode: if the.tsbuildinfo
file is not known to be an output of the rule, then Bazel will leave it in the output directory, and whentsc
runs, it may see that the outputs written by the prior invocation are up-to-date and skip the emit of these files. This will cause Bazel to intermittently fail with an error that some outputs were not written. This is why we depend oncomposite
and/orincremental
attributes to be provided, so we can tell Bazel to expect a.tsbuildinfo
output to ensure it is deleted before a subsequent compilation. At present, we don't do anything useful with the.tsbuildinfo
output, and this rule does not actually have incremental behavior. Deleting the file is actually counter-productive in terms of TypeScript compile performance. Follow #1726 -
When using Project References, TypeScript will expect to verify that the outputs of referenced projects are up-to-date with respect to their inputs. (This is true even without using the
--build
option). When using a non-sandboxed spawn strategy,tsc
can read the sources from otherts_project
rules in your project, and will expect that thetsconfig.json
file for those references will indicate where the outputs were written. However theoutDir
is determined by this Bazel rule so it cannot be known from reading thetsconfig.json
file. This problem is manifested as a TypeScript diagnostic likeerror TS6305: Output file '/path/to/execroot/a.d.ts' has not been built from source file '/path/to/execroot/a.ts'.
As a workaround, you can give the Windows "fastbuild" output directory as theoutDir
in your tsconfig file. On other platforms, the value isn't read so it does no harm. See https://github.com/bazelbuild/rules_nodejs/tree/master/packages/typescript/test/ts_project as an example. We hope this will be fixed in a future release of TypeScript; follow microsoft/TypeScript#37378 -
When TypeScript encounters an import statement, it adds the source file resolved by that reference to the program. However you may have included that source file in a different project, so this causes the problem mentioned above where a source file is in multiple programs. (Note, if you use Project References this is not the case, TS will know the referenced file is part of the other program.) This will result in duplicate emit for the same file, which produces an error since the files written to the output tree are read-only. Workarounds include using using Project References, or simply grouping the whole compilation into one program (if this doesn't exceed your time budget).
ts_project(name, tsconfig, srcs, args, deps, extends, declaration, source_map, declaration_map, composite, incremental, emit_declaration_only, tsc, validate, kwargs)
A name for the target.
We recommend you use the basename (no `.json` extension) of the tsconfig file that should be compiled.
Defaults to "tsconfig"
Label of the tsconfig.json file to use for the compilation.
By default, we add `.json` to the `name` attribute.
Defaults to None
List of labels of TypeScript source files to be provided to the compiler.
If absent, defaults to `**/*.ts[x]` (all TypeScript files in the package).
Defaults to None
List of strings of additional command-line arguments to pass to tsc.
Defaults to []
List of labels of other rules that produce TypeScript typings (.d.ts files)
Defaults to []
List of labels of tsconfig file(s) referenced in extends
section of tsconfig.
Must include any tsconfig files "chained" by extends clauses.
Defaults to None
if the declaration
bit is set in the tsconfig.
Instructs Bazel to expect a .d.ts
output for each .ts
source.
Defaults to False
if the sourceMap
bit is set in the tsconfig.
Instructs Bazel to expect a .js.map
output for each .ts
source.
Defaults to False
if the declarationMap
bit is set in the tsconfig.
Instructs Bazel to expect a .d.ts.map
output for each .ts
source.
Defaults to False
if the composite
bit is set in the tsconfig.
Instructs Bazel to expect a .tsbuildinfo
output and a .d.ts
output for each .ts
source.
Defaults to False
if the incremental
bit is set in the tsconfig.
Instructs Bazel to expect a .tsbuildinfo
output.
Defaults to False
if the emitDeclarationOnly
bit is set in the tsconfig.
Instructs Bazel not to expect .js
or .js.map
outputs for .ts
sources.
Defaults to False
Label of the TypeScript compiler binary to run.
Override this if your npm_install or yarn_install isn't named "npm"
For example, `tsc = "@my_deps//typescript/bin:tsc"`
Or you can pass a custom compiler binary instead.
Defaults to "@npm//typescript/bin:tsc"
boolean; whether to check that the tsconfig settings match the attributes.
Defaults to True
This repository rule should be called from your WORKSPACE file.
It creates some additional Bazel external repositories that are used internally by the TypeScript rules.
ts_setup_workspace()