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Transpiling TypeScript to JavaScript

The TypeScript compiler tsc can perform type-checking, transpilation to JavaScript, or both. Type-checking is typically slow, and is really only possible with TypeScript, not with alternative tools. Transpilation is mostly "erase the type syntax" and can be done well by a variety of tools.

ts_project allows us to split the work, with the following design goals:

  • The user should only need a single BUILD.bazel declaration: "these are my TypeScript sources and their dependencies".
  • Most developers have a working TypeScript Language Service in their editor, so they got type hinting before they ran bazel.
  • Development activities which rely only on runtime code, like running tests or manually verifying behavior in a devserver, should not need to wait on type-checking.
  • Type-checking still needs to be verified before checking in the code, but only needs to be as fast as a typical test.

Read more: https://blog.aspect.dev/typescript-speedup

ts_project#transpiler

The transpiler attribute of ts_project lets you select which tool produces the JavaScript outputs. Starting in rules_ts 2.0, we require you to select one of these, as there is no good default for all users.

SWC (recommended)

SWC is a fast transpiler, and the authors of rules_ts recommend using it. This option results in the fastest development round-trip time, however it may have subtle compatibility issues due to producing different JavaScript output than tsc. See aspect-build#398 for known issues.

To switch to SWC, follow these steps:

  1. Install a recent release of rules_swc

  2. Load swc. You can automate this by running:

    npx @bazel/buildozer 'fix movePackageToTop' //...:__pkg__
npx @bazel/buildozer 'new_load @aspect_rules_swc//swc:defs.bzl swc' //...:__pkg__

  3. In the simplest case you can skip passing attributes to swc (such as an .swcrc file). You can update your ts_project rules with this command:

    npx @bazel/buildozer 'set transpiler swc' //...:%ts_project

  4. However, most codebases do rely on configuration options for SWC. First, Synchronize settings with tsconfig.json to get an .swcrc file, then use a pattern like the following to pass this option to swc:

     load("@aspect_rules_swc//swc:defs.bzl", "swc")
 load("@bazel_skylib//lib:partial.bzl", "partial")

 ts_project(
     ...
     transpiler = partial.make(swc, swcrc = "//:.swcrc"),
 )

  5. Cleanup unused load statements:

    npx @bazel/buildozer 'fix unusedLoads' //...:__pkg__

TypeScript tsc

tsc can do transpiling along with type-checking. This is the simplest configuration without additional dependencies. However, it's also the slowest.

Note that rules_ts used to recommend a "Persistent Worker" mode to keep the tsc process running as a background daemon, however this introduces correctness issues in the build and is no longer recommended. As of rules_ts 2.0, the "Persistent Worker" mode is no longer enabled by default.

To choose this option for a single ts_project, set transpiler = "tsc". You can run npx @bazel/buildozer 'set transpiler "tsc"' //...:%ts_project to set the attribute on all ts_project rules.

If you use the default value transpiler = None, rules_ts will print an error. You can simply disable this error for all targets in the build, behaving the same as rules_ts 1.x. Just add this to `/.bazelrc``:

# Use "tsc" as the transpiler when ts_project has no `transpiler` set.
build --@aspect_rules_ts//ts:default_to_tsc_transpiler
fetch --@aspect_rules_ts//ts:default_to_tsc_transpiler
query --@aspect_rules_ts//ts:default_to_tsc_transpiler

Other Transpilers

The transpiler attribute accepts any rule or macro with this signature: (name, srcs, **kwargs) The **kwargs attribute propagates the tags, visibility, and testonly attributes from ts_project.

See the examples/transpiler directory for a simple example using Babel, or https://github.com/aspect-build/bazel-examples/tree/main/ts_project_transpiler for a more complete example that also shows usage of SWC.

If you need to pass additional attributes to the transpiler rule such as out_dir, you can use a partial to bind those arguments at the "make site", then pass that partial to this attribute where it will be called with the remaining arguments.

The transpiler rule or macro is responsible for predicting and declaring outputs. If you want to pre-declare the outputs (so that they can be addressed by a Bazel label, like //path/to:index.js) then you should use a macro which calculates the predicted outputs and supplies them to a ctx.attr.outputs attribute on the rule.

You may want to create a ts_project macro within your repository where your choice is setup, then load() from your own macro rather than from @aspect_rules_ts.

Macro expansion

When transpiler is used, then the ts_project macro expands to these targets:

  • [name] - the default target which can be included in the deps of downstream rules. Note that it will successfully build even if there are typecheck failures because invoking tsc is not needed to produce the default outputs. This is considered a feature, as it allows you to have a faster development mode where type-checking is not on the critical path.
  • [name]_typecheck - provides typings (.d.ts files) as the default output. Building this target always causes the typechecker to run.
  • [name]_typecheck_test - a build_test target which simply depends on the [name]_typecheck target. This ensures that typechecking will be run under bazel test with --build_tests_only.
  • [name]_typings - internal target which runs the binary from the tsc attribute
  • Any additional target(s) the custom transpiler rule/macro produces. (For example, some rules produce one target per TypeScript input file.)

Avoid eager type-checks via npm_package

A common pattern to link monorepo packages is to use the npm_package rule.

When typings files (*.d.ts) are included in the npm_package, this can cause the type-checker to run, even for a development round-trip that shouldn't need it.

For example,

ts_project(name = a) --foo.d.ts--> npm_package ---> npm_link_package ---> ts_project(name = b) ---> js_test

In this diagram, we'd like to be able to change the TypeScript sources of a and then re-run the test target, without waiting for type-checking. However, since foo.d.ts is declared as an input to the npm_package rule, Bazel needs to produce it.

To solve this, you can add the flag --@aspect_rules_js//npm:exclude_declarations_from_npm_packages to your bazel command.

Use this flag only for local development! You can add a line to your .bazelrc to make this easier to type, for example:

# Run bazel --config=dev to choose these options:
build:dev --@aspect_rules_js//npm:exclude_declarations_from_npm_packages