Babel Root Import

Babel plugin to add the opportunity to use import and require with root based paths.

Example

// Usually
import SomeExample from '../../../some/example.js';
const OtherExample = require('../../../other/example.js');

// With Babel-Root-Importer
import SomeExample from '~/some/example.js';
const OtherExample = require('~/other/example.js');

Install

npm

npm install babel-plugin-root-import --save-dev

yarn

yarn add babel-plugin-root-import --dev

Use

Add a .babelrc file and write:

{
  "plugins": [
    ["babel-plugin-root-import"]
  ]
}

or pass the plugin with the plugins-flag on CLI

babel-node myfile.js --plugins babel-plugin-root-import

Extras

Custom root-path-suffix

If you want a custom root because for example all your files are in the src/js folder you can define this in your .babelrc file

{
  "plugins": [
    ["babel-plugin-root-import", {
      "rootPathSuffix": "src/js"
    }]
  ]
}

Custom root-path-prefix

If you don't like the ~ syntax you can just use your own symbol (for example a @ symbol or \)

{
  "plugins": [
    ["babel-plugin-root-import", {
      "rootPathPrefix": "@"
    }]
  ]
}

// Now you can use the plugin like:
import foo from '@/my-file';

Multiple custom prefixes and suffixes

You can supply an array of the above. The plugin will try each prefix/suffix pair in the order they are defined.

{
  "plugins": [
    ["babel-plugin-root-import", [{
      "rootPathPrefix": "~", // `~` is the default so you can remove this if you want
      "rootPathSuffix": "src/js"
    }, {
      "rootPathPrefix": "@",
      "rootPathSuffix": "other-src/js"
    }, {
      "rootPathPrefix": "#",
      "rootPathSuffix": "../../src/in/parent" // since we suport relative paths you can also go into a parent directory
    }]]
  ]
}

// Now you can use the plugin like:
import foo from '~/my-file';
const bar = require('@/my-file');

Don't let ESLint be confused

If you use eslint-plugin-import to validate imports it may be necessary to instruct ESLint to parse root imports. You can use eslint-import-resolver-babel-plugin-root-import

    "import/resolver": {
      "babel-plugin-root-import": {}
    }

Don't let Flow be confused

If you use Facebook's Flow for type-checking it is necessary to instruct it on how to map your chosen prefix to the root directory. Add the following to your .flowconfig file, replacing {rootPathPrefix} with your chosen prefix and {rootPathSuffix} with your chosen suffix.

[options]
module.name_mapper='^{rootPathPrefix}/\(.*\)$' -> '<PROJECT_ROOT>/{rootPathSuffix}/\1'

FYI

Webpack delivers a similar feature, if you just want to prevent end-less import strings you can also define aliases in the resolve module, at the moment it doesn't support custom/different symbols and multiple/custom suffixes. READ MORE

Want to revert back to relative paths?

Sometimes tooling might not be up to scratch, meaning you lose features such as navigation in your IDE. In such cases you might want to revert back to using relative paths again. If you have a significant amount of files, it might be worth looking into tooling to help you with the conversion.

Change Log

5.0.0 - 2017-02-10

• More consistent name: babel-plugin-root-import #63
• Renamed everything
• Publish with new name on npm

4.1.5 - 2016-11-17

• Compile new version and release again

4.1.4 - 2016-11-15

• Improve support for relative paths (e.g. referencing parent folders via ../) (thanks to @Hizoul)

4.1.3 - 2016-09-14

• Support paths (thanks to @sivael)

4.1.0 - 2016-08-20

• Use relative paths instead of absolute ones (thanks to @nescalante)

4.0.0 - 2016-06-29

• Almost everything changed, thanks to @sheepsteak, @gingur, @olalonde

3.2.2 - 2016-02-20

• Fix custom suffix in path, missing / in generated paths

3.2.0 - 2016-02-19

• Support Windows-Filesystem
• Add possibility to configure a custom rootPath-Symbol (instead of ~ you can use whatever you like)

3.1.0 - 2015-12-01

• Add possibility config the custom root path

3.0.1 - 2015-11-30

• Updated plugin to new babel6 API
• Splitted tests and functions into two scopes with single tests
• Removed the "extra-root" param for the .babelrc since this is no yet supported in babel6

2.0.1 - 2015-11-15

Breaking Change to Babel 5

• Updated to Babel 6
• Added integration tests

1.0.1 - 2015-08-07

• Added / updated tests
• Implemented ESlint