Use public/ for outDir by default

[kabouzeid]

This is more similar to what Laravel Mix does. By setting emptyOutDir = false, the build dir is no longer cleared by Vite.

Also I've ran into problems with public/build/assets because some Vite plugins assume that files in outDir/assets are served from the /assets route.

[innocenzi]

I didn't know about emptyOutDir, but I'm quite happy with the current build directory default. I personally dislike having assets generated right into public. Could you tell me more about the exact issues you encountered so I can see if it's worth the change? I'd love some links to the plugins you're talking about as well. Thank you!

[kabouzeid]

I'm using a Vite plugin for bundling Rust WebAssembly.
The .wasm asset is placed in the asset dir (see: https://github.com/lencx/vite-plugin-rsw/blob/a3e237ca8454bce9b5a96fef09419bb888cc3831/src/index.ts#L47) and later fetched from / (see: same file, line 59).
Not sure whether this plugin does it the "right" way.

But at least it shows that public/ is a sensible default for the outDir since it matches the default behavior of Vite and the default behavior of Laravel Mix. Also it's still possible to achieve the current result :)

[kabouzeid]

After looking at it again, I think the plugin I mentioned above is doing it wrong and should use something like base/file instead of /file.

[innocenzi]

After looking at it again, I think the plugin I mentioned above is doing it wrong and should use something like base/file instead of /file.

You're right, the plugin should use config?.build?.outDir in addition to assetsDir, since the latter is relative to the former.

But at least it shows that public/ is a sensible default for the outDir since it matches the default behavior of Vite and the default behavior of Laravel Mix. Also it's still possible to achieve the current result :)

I think you're half-right: while having consistency is good, sometimes the conventions are not perfect. Like I said, I'm really not a fan of having everything in public (as a matter of fact, before this commit, there was no way to not clean the outDir).

If you personally prefer it, you can change build_path in vite.php and add build.emptyOutDir to your vite.config.ts.

Since your specific issue is fixable, and since I'd rather avoid the breaking change, I'll close the PR. Hope you're okay with that. Good luck with your project!

[kabouzeid]

Sure, I completely understand. In the meantime I've fixed this upstream, thanks :)
If someone with a similar problem comes across this, here is the relevant PR: rwasm/vite-plugin-rsw#4