onchange-mini

run a command on file(s) change, the minimalist way

Motivation

It happened repetively that onchange didn't work for me, for reasons I couldn't track down. So, out of frustration, I wrote a minimalist implementation that would just do the thing I needed: watching a few files and running a script when they change. And it worked! So I wrapped it into this module, mostly for my own use, but maybe you will find it useful too.

Installation

To make it accessible to scripts in a project (learn more):

npm install --save-dev onchange-mini

Or to make it accessible globally:

npm install -g onchange-mini

How-to

Watch file(s) changes

onchange-mini ./a/file/to/watch ./another/file -- echo 'the wind of CHAaaAAAaaaNGE ♪ ♫'
# works great with npm scripts
onchange-mini ./a/file/to/watch ./another/file -- npm run build'

Watch directories

onchange-mini ./a/folder/to/watch ./another/folder -- the command to execute

:warning: :one: this will only trigger an event when a file is created, renamed, or removed, not when the files themselves change.

:warning: :two: this isn't watching recursively: any file change in subfolders won't be detected

You can work around :warning: :one: by watching both the directory and its files like so

onchange-mini ./a/folder/to/watch ./a/folder/to/watch/* -- the command to execute

but beware that it needs to be restarted to watch new files

Debug

export DEBUG=true; onchange-mini ./a/file/to/watch -- the command to execute

For any other feature

Option 1: use onchange if it works for you

Option 2:

• open ./index.js
• hack your way
• minimalist PR welcome