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0 pointsLerc1y ago0 comments

Is there a super simple tool for turning statically served websites into PWAs?

Last time I looked all of the simple tools had been deprecated in favour of complex tools that do way more than I need.

If I had a site in a directory that works fine from

    >cd MyWebApp
    >python3 -m http.server

I would like a command line tool That worked like

    >becomepwa MyWebApp

Which produced a PWA that downloaded everything on install and could be run henceforth offline.

I thought this would be a common use case, but I failed to find anything that supported it without intruding on my workflow.

0 comments

giancarlostoro1y ago

Three things you need:

* Manifest file

* HTTPS - for localhost I dont remember the workaround, browsers have made this increasingly more complicated from recent experiences

* Service Worker - This is where I said I had maybe 60 lines of JavaScript.

If you have these three things, a browser should pick up that your sites a PWA and server running it should be irrelevant... So you MUST have a minimal amount of JavaScript, but I did it using pure vanilla JS, you dont need a fancy framework.

On that same note, there might be a tool that could inject the bare JS necessary for this, but I dont think it exists, certainly could be built.

LercOP1y ago

HTTPS isn't an issue, dropping whatever the command generates onto a HTTPS supporting server isn't an issue.

I want the manifest to be automatically generated from whatever is in the directory. The service worker should download everything from the manifest at first launch. I'm ok with a download-on-demand build option, but by default it should grab everything needed. If a user installs something, it should be assumed that they can use it offline.

I feel like the tool should already exist. If it does not yet exist, it seems like there must be a reason for that that I am not aware of.

iforgot221y ago

The service worker thing is a weird amount of boilerplate. Every time I go back to making a PWA, I skip through 10 search results explaining what a service worker is (idc) until I just find whatever .js code I have to copy. And it's not some trivial one-liner.

I get that in theory a PWA can do offline stuff and whatever, but 99% of the time someone is only making a PWA to make the app installable on a phone home screen.

giancarlostoro1y ago

It is not a trivial one liner no, but you need 3 events implemented in your service-worker file, then in your main.js file you register it.

Service workers are just JavaScript that runs in the background in their own process in a browser. Could think of them as separate threads. Anyway, all of that can be done in less than 20 lines of JS?

I consider it simple compared to people building React apps and making the process more complicated than it needs to be just to build a PWA.

I was able to build a PWA out of a bootstrap HTML5 web app, with minimal JS for REST calls and ag-grid population.

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0 pointsLerc1y ago0 comments

Is there a super simple tool for turning statically served websites into PWAs?

Last time I looked all of the simple tools had been deprecated in favour of complex tools that do way more than I need.

If I had a site in a directory that works fine from

    >cd MyWebApp
    >python3 -m http.server

I would like a command line tool That worked like

    >becomepwa MyWebApp

Which produced a PWA that downloaded everything on install and could be run henceforth offline.

I thought this would be a common use case, but I failed to find anything that supported it without intruding on my workflow.

0 comments

giancarlostoro1y ago

Three things you need:

* Manifest file

* HTTPS - for localhost I dont remember the workaround, browsers have made this increasingly more complicated from recent experiences

* Service Worker - This is where I said I had maybe 60 lines of JavaScript.

On that same note, there might be a tool that could inject the bare JS necessary for this, but I dont think it exists, certainly could be built.

LercOP1y ago

HTTPS isn't an issue, dropping whatever the command generates onto a HTTPS supporting server isn't an issue.

I feel like the tool should already exist. If it does not yet exist, it seems like there must be a reason for that that I am not aware of.

iforgot221y ago

I get that in theory a PWA can do offline stuff and whatever, but 99% of the time someone is only making a PWA to make the app installable on a phone home screen.

giancarlostoro1y ago

It is not a trivial one liner no, but you need 3 events implemented in your service-worker file, then in your main.js file you register it.

I consider it simple compared to people building React apps and making the process more complicated than it needs to be just to build a PWA.

I was able to build a PWA out of a bootstrap HTML5 web app, with minimal JS for REST calls and ag-grid population.

2 more replies

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse