Error: Dot.buildAndAttach is not a function

[the-drunk-coder]

Hi,

I'm trying to draw dotted notes, but somehow I'm getting an error that

Uncaught TypeError: Dot.buildAndAttach is not a function

Not sure how to fix this ... I'm on latest Vexflow 4, using the vexfow4 package from npm ...

[AaronDavidNewman]

You really need to share some code with us on a fiddle or something. buildAndAttach is a static method of Dot, so make sure you import {Dot}.

[the-drunk-coder]

Here's the relevant code as copied from my project, with the difference that I import from node_modules instead of from the web:

https://jsfiddle.net/adzty1kf/

In my project I import via:

<script src="/node_modules/vexflow4/releases/vexflow-min.js"></script>

instead of:

<script src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/[email protected]/build/cjs/vexflow.js"></script>

The fiddle works, though, and in fact, when I use the second variant in my project, it works as well ... so maybe there's something broken in the npm release ?

EDIT: everything else works as expected when importing via the npm method

[AaronDavidNewman]

When I look in 'vexflow-min.js', I see this at the end:

// YOU ARE LOOKING AT VEXFLOW LEGACY VERSION 3.0.9.
// SEE THE `build/` FOLDER FOR THE NEWEST RELEASE.

So that is likely your issue. Use the build/cjs version of vexflow.js or vexflow-debug.js

[the-drunk-coder]

hmm that's odd, as I'm using a package from npm that has only been created about a month ago, as indicated in this comment:

#1625 (comment)

It's marked in npm as version 4.2.5 --> https://www.npmjs.com/package/vexflow4

In my package.json I use that version number as well:

"dependencies": {
        "osc": "2.4.0",
        "vexflow4": "4.2.5"
    }

So if vexflow-min.js really is version 3.0.9, then that'd be really counterintuitive ...

[AaronDavidNewman]

The code and versions in build directory are 4.2.5. The releases directory is pre-built. I think they keep some older version around for the visual regression tests, or maybe it was an oversight (maybe @ronyeh has an idea).

I think in all cases you want to use one of the packages in /build/cjs, as this would have been build with latest source code.

[ronyeh]

Hello @AaronDavidNewman and @the-drunk-coder,

Sorry for the confusion! Yes, we had been keeping around the legacy version of VexFlow (v 3.0.9) in the releases/ directory.

This was because some old websites and old JSFiddles that depended on v3.0.9 linked directly to:
https://unpkg.com/vexflow/releases/vexflow-min.js

If we had removed the releases/ directly when we published v4.x, we would have broken those old sites. Even if we put v4.x into the releases/ directory (overwriting 3.0.9), we would have broken those old sites, since 4.x introduced breaking changes.

Yes, it's confusing that we ship the legacy version alongside the current one in the build/ directory.

4.x has been out long enough now (and we're working on 5.x). I think it's time we remove that releases/ folder. It's OK if those older JSFiddles break. :-)

I'll introduce a PR to remove the releases/ folder from the NPM package.