gnode
Run node with ES6 Generators, today!
gnode
is a very light wrapper around your node
executable that ensures
ES6 Generator support, even on versions of node that do not
support ES6 Generators natively.
You use it exactly like the regular node
executable, except that you do not
need to pass the --harmony-generators
flag. That is where the magic happens.
With gnode
you can use co
or suspend
, or any other
Generator-based flow control based module, today!
How does this magic work?
node < 0.11.3
When V8 provides no native ES6 generators support, then gnode
invokes a node
instance with a patched require.extensions['.js']
function, which transparently
transpiles your ES6 code with Generators into ES5-compatible code. We can thank
facebook/regenerator
for making this possible.
Under the hood, this command:
$ gnode foo.js all the args
Turns into something like this:
$ GNODE_ENTRY_POINT=foo.js node fallback.js all the args
node >= 0.11.3
When V8 supports ES6 generators natively, then gnode
invokes a node instance
with the --harmony-generators
flag passed in transparently, so that the native
generators are used, and no transpiling takes place. Everything else just works
as you would expect it to.
Under the hood, this command:
$ gnode foo.js all the args
Turns into something like this:
$ node --harmony-generators foo.js all the args
Installation
Install the gnode
executable via npm:
$ npm install -g gnode
CLI Examples
The gnode
executable uses whatever version of node is installed in your PATH
:
Here's our example t.js
file:
var co = require('co');
function sleep (ms) {
return function (fn) {
setTimeout(fn, ms);
};
}
co(function* () {
for (var i = 0; i < 5; i++) {
console.log(i);
yield sleep(1000);
}
})();
This script with an ES6 Generator in it can be run using any version of node
by using gnode
:
☮ ~ (master) ∴ n 0.8.26
☮ ~ (master) ∴ gnode -v
v0.8.26
☮ ~ (master) ∴ gnode t.js
0
1
2
3
4
☮ ~ (master) ∴ n 0.10.21
☮ ~ (master) ∴ gnode -v
v0.10.21
☮ ~ (master) ∴ gnode t.js
0
1
2
3
4
☮ ~ (master) ∴ n 0.11.8
☮ ~ (master) ∴ gnode -v
v0.11.8
☮ ~ (master) ∴ gnode t.js
0
1
2
3
4
Programmatic API
You can also just require('gnode')
in a script without any generators, and
then require()
any other .js file that has generators after that.
require('gnode');
var gen = require('./someGenerator');
// etc…