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https://github.com/yan-foto/electron-reload

Simplest (:pray:) way to reload an electron app on file changes!
https://github.com/yan-foto/electron-reload

electron electron-reload refreshes

Last synced: about 1 month ago
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Simplest (:pray:) way to reload an electron app on file changes!

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README 

        
# electron reload

This is (*hopefully*) the simplest way to load contents of all active [`BrowserWindow`s](https://github.com/atom/electron/blob/master/docs/api/browser-window.md) within electron when the source files are changed.



[![Linting](https://github.com/yan-foto/electron-reload/actions/workflows/node.js.yml/badge.svg)](https://github.com/yan-foto/electron-reload/actions/workflows/node.js.yml)

[![npm](https://img.shields.io/npm/v/electron-reload.svg)](https://www.npmjs.com/package/electron-reload)

[![Code Climate](https://codeclimate.com/github/yan-foto/electron-reload/badges/gpa.svg)](https://codeclimate.com/github/yan-foto/electron-reload)

[![Known Vulnerabilities](https://snyk.io/test/github/yan-foto/electron-reload/badge.svg)](https://snyk.io/test/github/yan-foto/electron-reload)

![license](https://img.shields.io/npm/l/electron-reload.svg)



# Installation

```

npm install electron-reload

```



# Usage

Just initialize this module with desired glob or file path to watch and let it refresh electron browser windows as targets are changed:



```js

'use strict';



const {app, BrowserWindow} = require('electron');



const electronReload = require('electron-reload')



// Standard stuff

app.on('ready', () => {

  let mainWindow = new BrowserWindow({width: 800, height: 600});



  mainWindow.loadUrl(`file://${__dirname}/index.html`);

  // the rest...

});

```



Note that the above code only refreshes `WebContent`s of all `BrowserWindow`s. So if you want to have a hard reset (starting a new electron process) you can just pass the path to the electron executable in the `options` object:



```js

const path = require('path')



require('electron-reload')(__dirname, {

  electron: path.join(__dirname, 'node_modules', '.bin', 'electron')

});

```



If your app overrides some of the default `quit` or `close` actions (e.g. closing the last app window hides the window instead of quitting the app) then the default `electron-reload` hard restart could leave you with multiple instances of your app running. In these cases you can change the default hard restart action from `app.quit()` to `app.exit()` by specifying the hard reset method in the electron-reload options:



```js

const path = require('path')



require('electron-reload')(__dirname, {

  electron: path.join(__dirname, 'node_modules', '.bin', 'electron'),

  hardResetMethod: 'exit'

});

```



# API

`electron_reload(paths, options)`

* `paths`: a file, directory or glob pattern to watch

* `options` (optional) containing:

  - [`chokidar`](https://github.com/paulmillr/chokidar) options

  - `electron` property pointing to electron executables.

  - `electronArgv` string array with command line options passed to the Electron executable. Only used when hard resetting.

  - `appArgv`: string array with command line options passed to the Electron app. Only used when hard resetting.

  - `forceHardReset`: enables hard reset for **every** file change and not only the main file



  `options` will default to `{ignored: /node_modules|[\/\\]\./, argv: []}`.



# Why this module?

Simply put, I was tired and confused by all other available modules which are so complicated\* for such an uncomplicated task!



\* *e.g. start a local HTTP server, publish change events through a WebSocket, etc.!*



# Changelog

 - **2.0.0-alpha.1**:

   - Update outdated dependencies.

   - Fix #35: throw error instead of logging to console.

   - Fix #65: add TypeScript definitions.

   - Fix #78: minor README fixes.

   - Fix #87: enable passing arguments to the app itself.

 - **1.5.0**:

   - Upgrade `chokidar` from v2 to v3 (lighter/faster installation)

   - Add friendly linting in dev mode (`node run lint`) and fix CI linting issues (see [#62](https://github.com/yan-foto/electron-reload/pull/62))

 - **1.4.1**: Fix two minor bugs

   - Wrong globbing when doing hard reset ([`#58`](https://github.com/yan-foto/electron-reload/issues/58))

   - Issues with locating main file in specific project structures ([`#57`](https://github.com/yan-foto/electron-reload/issues/57))

 - **1.4.0**: Enable hard reset for all changes (and not only the main file)

 - **1.3.0**: Allow passing arguments to electron executable upon hard resets

 - **1.2.5**: Upgrade dependencies (fix vulnerabilities)

 - **1.2.4**: Use `index.js` as fallback if `main` is not defined in `package.json`

 - **1.2.3**: Fix multiple instances on restart

 - **1.2.2**: Fix `browserWindows[]` indexing

 - **1.2.1**: Remove logging from production code (d'oh)

 - **1.2.0**: Allow hard reset in multiple browser windows

 - **1.1.0**: Add `app.exit()` in addition to `app.quit()` for hard resets

 - **1.0.3**: Fix hard reset bug

 - **1.0.2**: Detach child so that killing parent doesn't kill it (on windows)

 - **1.0.1**: Replace `extend` with `Object.assign`

 - **1.0.0**: Adapt to Electron 1.0 new API

 - **0.3.0**: Use new method of accessing `app` (e.g. `require(electron).app`)

 - **0.2.0**: Use new electrons (> v0.32.3) `browser-window-created` event