Build Process & Boilerplate

[priley86]

Build Process

Today, most React communities use Webpack. Can we agree that Webpack/Babel should be the standard to transpile our es6 to es5?

Boilerplate

What boilerplate would we like to see used to seed this repository? This should be the standard starting boilerplate we can share with developers creating new React apps with Patternfly. The create-react-app boiler seems to be a compelling option at this point (which would also encourage webpack, babel, Autoprefixer, eslint, and Jest amongst other OS tools). Would this be your first option for this repository? Are there any others we should consider?

[matobet]

@priley86 Definitely huge 👍 @ Webpack/Babel but perhaps create-react-app is too much for something that is intended to be ultimately consumed as a library. The standard create-react-app contains a lot of stuff that is relevant for "standalone" projects which would more likely stand in the way...

From my little experience in developing shared React(and Redux) components that are consumed in our new frontend currently being developed we went with custom webpack setup for the components and create-react-app (either ejected or non-ejected) boilerplate for the end-client application and showcase/demos using those library components.

[priley86]

thanks very much @matobet for sharing this and it's definitely noted. I'm still not sure whether we want to treat this as a "library" only repository or as a "starter kit" which contains boilerplate code along with library components. We could certainly support both if we wanted here, or just take the "library" only approach. I did something on a very simple level like you have described with this one. Will wait for others to weigh in on this...

[gregsheremeta]

As long as it's usable as a library either way :) I'm not sure we would use a starter kit, but that would of course be useful for new projects. +1 to showcase projects -- I guess a starter kit is a kind of showcase...

[jtomasek]

+1 to Webpack + Babel base

+1 to using create-react-app for a 'showcase' app which IIUC is going to be part of this repository.
As mentioned previously, create-react-app is not suitable for library-type projects, so we would have to have separate build process which builds the library alongside the create-react-app one.

Important thing is that patternfly-react component should be exported (and consumable) in a way which does not dictate any requirements to applications that consume them. E.g. if patternfly-react components use Flow typing, follow certain linting rules, use ES6, have certain dependencies, etc. None of this should be required from consuming application. So the components need to be properly compiled. (Of course there are some exceptions such as peer dependencies on patternfly-css, react, etc.)

[priley86]

@jtomasek agree with all of this (and it certainly seems we are learning towards library only approach). Maybe you can contribute a simple es6 component this week or next to kickstart us when you have a chance? This would give us a good starting point to review and make notes on as we get going (and confirm we could all consume it in our apps). I am hoping to get some more time next sprint to start contributing some to this, so would like to review other's ideas first here ;)

@jtomasek I will talk to @bleathem @andresgalante @LHinson more about the showcase app once we are ready. I'm sure they will have some ideas, but it does sound we'd like a create-react-app boiler some place (so I think this might be a good opportunity in the showcase repo or a gh-pages branch).

[jtomasek]

@priley86 cool!, I'll try to bring something up by the end of this week so we can test the approach.