Garrett Moore garrettmmoore

VSCode Node + Babel Recipe

Debug Modern JavaScript with VSCode. Part of VSCode Course.

1. init a module:

npm init -y

The Rules of React

All libraries have subtle rules that you have to follow for them to work well. Often these are implied and undocumented rules that you have to learn as you go. This is an attempt to document the rules of React renders. Ideally a type system could enforce it.

What Functions Are "Pure"?

A number of methods in React are assumed to be "pure".

On classes that's the constructor, getDerivedStateFromProps, shouldComponentUpdate and render.

If you are like me you find yourself cloning a repo, making some proposed changes and then deciding to later contributing back using the GitHub Flow convention. Below is a set of instructions I've developed for myself on how to deal with this scenario and an explanation of why it matters based on jagregory's gist.

To follow GitHub flow you should really have created a fork initially as a public representation of the forked repository and the clone that instead. My understanding is that the typical setup would have your local repository pointing to your fork as origin and the original forked repository as upstream so that you can use these keywords in other git commands.

Clone some repo (you've probably already done this step)
```
git clone git@github...some-repo.git
```

Debugging ES6 in VS Code

My current editor of choice for all things related to Javascript and Node is VS Code, which I highly recommend. The other day I needed to hunt down a bug in one of my tests written in ES6, which at time of writing is not fully supported in Node. Shortly after, I found myself down the rabbit hole of debugging in VS Code and realized this isn't as straightforward as I thought initially. This short post summarizes the steps I took to make debugging ES6 in VS Code frictionless.

What doesn't work

My first approach was a launch configuration in launch.json mimicking tape -r babel-register ./path/to/testfile.js with babel configured to create inline sourcemaps in my package.json. The debugging started but breakpoints and stepping through the code in VS Code were a complete mess. Apparently, ad-hoc transpilation via babel-require-hook and inline sourcemaps do not work in VS Code. The same result for attaching (instead of launch) to `babel-node

DEPRECATED as of macOS 10.13 (High Sierra). See the new GUIDE to install nvm and yarn for macOS (updated July 2019)

Fixing npm On Mac OS X for Homebrew Users

Installing node through Homebrew can cause problems with npm for globally installed packages. To fix it quickly, use the solution below. An explanation is also included at the end of this document.

Solution

This solution fixes the error caused by trying to run npm update npm -g. Once you're finished, you also won't need to use sudo to install npm modules globally.

Install HomeBrew first

brew update
brew tap caskroom/cask
brew install brew-cask

If you get the error "already installed", follow the instructions to unlink it, then install again:

OBSOLETE

This entire guide is based on an old version of Homebrew/Node and no longer applies. It was only ever intended to fix a specific error message which has since been fixed. I've kept it here for historical purposes, but it should no longer be used. Homebrew maintainers have fixed things and the options mentioned don't exist and won't work.

I still believe it is better to manually install npm separately since having a generic package manager maintain another package manager is a bad idea, but the instructions below don't explain how to do that.

Fixing npm On Mac OS X for Homebrew Users

Installing node through Homebrew can cause problems with npm for globally installed packages. To fix it quickly, use the solution below. An explanation is also included at the end of this document.

	/*
	Instructions for MacOS:

	- Install the fonts 'Operator Mono' & 'Fira Code'
	- Install theme 'Dark Candy'
	- Add the following config to the VS Code settings.json:

	{
	"editor.renderWhitespace": "all",
	"editor.fontSize": 14,

	using UnityEngine;
	using System.Collections;

	public class FlyCamera : MonoBehaviour {

	/*
	Writen by Windexglow 11-13-10. Use it, edit it, steal it I don't care.
	Converted to C# 27-02-13 - no credit wanted.
	Simple flycam I made, since I couldn't find any others made public.
	Made simple to use (drag and drop, done) for regular keyboard layout


	/* Kinda like Python's defaultdict, but for JS*/
	function defDict(type) {
	var dict = {};
	return {
	get: function (key) {
	if (!dict[key]) {
	dict[key] = type.constructor();
	}
	return dict[key];