prebuild

A command line tool for easily doing prebuilds for multiple version of node/iojs on a specific platform.

$ npm install -g prebuild

Features

• Builds native modules for any version of node/iojs, without having to switch between different versions of node/iojs to do so. This works by only downloading the correct headers and telling node-gyp to use those instead of the ones installed on your system.
• Upload (--upload) prebuilt binaries to GitHub.
• Installs (--install) prebuilt binaries from GitHub by default or from a host of your choice. The url format can be customized as you see fit.
• Installed binaries are cached in ~/.npm/_prebuilds/ so you only need to download them once.
• Support for stripping (--strip) debug information.

Building

Building is only required for targets with different ABI versions. To build for all supported abi versions greater than 0.8 (example from leveldown):

prebuild --all

Alternatively, to build for some specific versions you can do:

prebuild -b 0.10.42 -b 0.12.10 -b 4.3.0

See targets.js for currently available versions.

For more options run prebuild --help. The prebuilds created are compatible with node-pre-gyp

Uploading

prebuild supports uploading prebuilds to GitHub releases. If the release doesn't exist, it will be created for you. To upload prebuilds simply add the -u <github-token> option:

$ prebuild --all -u <github-token>

If you don't want to use the token on cli you can put it in ~/.prebuildrc:

upload=<github-token>

Note that --upload will only upload the targets that was built and stored in ./prebuilds, so prebuild -u <github-token> -b 4.3.0 will only upload the binary for the 4.3.0 target.

You can use prebuild --upload-all to upload all files from the ./prebuilds folder.

Installing

prebuild supports installing prebuilt binaries from GitHub by default. To install for your platform, use the --install flag.

$ prebuild --install

If no suitable binary can be found, prebuild will fallback to node-gyp rebuild. Native modules that have a javascript fallback can use --no-compile to prevent this.

Once a binary has been downloaded prebuild will require() the module and if that fails it will also fallback to building it.

Installed binaries are cached in your npm cache meaning you'll only have to download them once.

Add prebuild --install to your package.json so the binaries will be installed when the module is installed

{
  "name": "a-native-module",
  "scripts": {
    "install": "prebuild --install"
  },
  "dependencies": {
    "prebuild": "^4.0.0"
  }
}

If you are hosting your binaries elsewhere you can provide a host to the --install flag. The host string can also be a template for constructing more intrinsic urls. Install from example.com with a custom format for the binary name:

$ prebuild --install https://example.com/{name}-{version}-{abi}-{platform}{libc}-{arch}.tar.gz

--install will download binaries when installing from npm and compile in other cases. If you want prebuild to always download binaries you can use --download instead of --install. Either way, if downloading fails for any reason, it will fallback to compiling the code.

There's also support for node-pre-gyp style by utilizing the binary property in package.json.

Formatting urls

The following placeholders can be used:

• {name} or {package_name}: the package name taken from package.json
• {version}: package version taken from package.json
• {major}: major version taken from version
• {minor}: minor version taken from version
• {patch}: patch version taken from version
• {prerelease}: prelease version taken from version
• {build}: build version taken from version
• {abi} or {node_abi}: ABI version of node/iojs taken from current --target or process.version if not specified, see ABI section below for more information
• {platform}: platform taken from --platform or process.platform if not specified
• {arch}: architecture taken from --arch or process.arch if not specified
• {libc}: libc setting for alternative libc taken from --libc or LIBC env var or blank if not specified
• {configuration}: 'Debug' if --debug is specified, otherwise 'Release'
• {module_name}: taken from binary.module_name property from package.json

Create GitHub Token

A GitHub token is needed for two reasons:

• Create a GitHub release (leveldown example)
• Upload the prebuilt binaries to that release

To create a token:

• Go to this page
• Click the Generate new token button
• Give the token a name and click the Generate token button, see below

The default scopes should be fine.

Help

$ prebuild -h
prebuild [options]

  --path        -p  path        (make a prebuild here)
  --target      -t  version     (version to build or install for)
  --prebuild    -b  version     (version to prebuild against)
  --all                         (prebuild for all known abi versions)
  --install                     (download when using npm, compile otherwise)
  --download    -d  [url]       (download prebuilds, no url means github)
  --upload      -u  [gh-token]  (upload prebuilds to github)
  --upload-all  -u  [gh-token]  (upload all files from ./prebuilds folder to github)
  --preinstall  -i  script      (run this script before prebuilding)
  --compile     -c              (compile your project using node-gyp)
  --no-compile                  (skip compile fallback when downloading)
  --abi                         (use provided abi rather than system abi)
  --libc                        (use provided libc rather than system default)
  --backend                     (specify build backend, default is 'node-gyp')
  --strip                       (strip debug information)
  --debug                       (set Debug or Release configuration)
  --verbose                     (log verbosely)
  --version                     (print prebuild version and exit)

JavaScript API

var prebuild = require('prebuild')

.download(opts, cb)

Options:

• .pkg the parsed package.json
• .log (optional)
• .nolocal Don't check for cached builds (optional)
• .updateName Function to update the binary name (optional)
• .path Location of the module (default: ".")
• .abi Node ABI version (default: process.versions.modules)
• .libc OS libc (default: blank)
• .platform OS platform (default: process.platform)
• .download Precomputed url to download the binary from (optional)
• .all (default: false)
• .force (default: false)
• .proxy (default: process.env['HTTP_PROXY'])
• .https-proxy (default: process.env['HTTP-PROXY'])`

Example:

prebuild.download({
  pkg: require('./package.json')
}, function (err) {
  // ...
})

.build(opts, version, cb)

Options:

• .log (optional)
• .preinstall (optional)
• .gyp Provide a custom node-gyp instance (optional)
• .backend Provide a custom node-gyp instance via string. Alternatives are 'node-gyp' and 'node-ninja' (optional, defaults to 'node-gyp')
• .args Additional command line arguments to node-gyp (optional)
• .debug Pass in --debug on command line to gyp backend (optional)

Example:

prebuild.build({}, version, function (err) {
  // ...
})

Global options:

• .debug Download or build a debug build (default: false)
• .arch Processor architecture (default: process.arch)

Develop prebuild

If you want to hack on prebuild you need an environment to play around with. We recommend a setup similar to the following:

• A fork of prebuild
• A GitHub token (see above)
• A native node module

$ git clone [email protected]:<your-nick>/prebuild
$ cd prebuild && npm link && cd ..
$ git clone [email protected]:<your-nick>/some-native-module

Since you did npm link on prebuild it will be installed globally. Now you can go ahead and try things out.

$ cd some-native-module
$ prebuild --all --strip -u <github-token>

This command would:

• Build some-native-module for all targets listed in targets.js and store them in ./prebuilds/
• Strip binaries from debug information
• Create a release on GitHub, if needed
• Upload all binaries to that release, if not already uploaded

Before you commit your changes and send us a pull request, do run npm test.

License

MIT