Export a runnable function

Wraps a function so that it is called when run directly but returned when required in. This is especially useful for micro services and and SOA architectures, but can be used for many other things.

Usage

$ npm install runnable

Basic usage:

// index.js

var runnable = require('runnable');

module.exports = runnable(function (opts) {
	console.log(opts.foo);
}, [{
	foo: 'bar'
}], module); // bar

// bin/foo.js

var foo = require('../index.js');

foo({
	foo: 'other bar'
}); // other bar

Usage with multiple runnable instances in one process is a little bit different due to the behavior of node's module.parent implementation which sets the parent to the first module to import the file, as opposed to the actual parent which required it in this time. So to work in this kind of an enviornment you need to pass a final parameter to the runnable call.

var runnable = require('runnable');

module.exports = runnable(function foo () {
	console.log('foo');
}, module);

var runnable = require('runnable');

module.exports = runnable(function bar () {
	console.log('bar');
}, module);

var foo = require('../foo.js');
var bar = require('../bar.js');

foo(); // foo
bar(); // bar

Usage with Browserify

If you are using this module with browserify, it will not work by default. Browserify does not implement module.parent or require.main. Luckily Browserify allows you to provide your own require implementation via the prelude option. This module comes with an implementation which implements the required fields. Hopefully this will get added so Browserify once I make the case. In the mean time you can do this:

var b = browserify('index.js', {
	prelude: require('runnable/browserify-prelude')
}).bundle();

API

runnable(fnc <Function>[,defaults <Array>[, module <Object>]]);

• fnc: The runnable function
• defaults: Defaults that will be passed to the function when called directly
• module: The module the function is declared in, literally module from the commonjs file

Usage in micro-services/SOA

This is an example of how we use this pattern to give production configuration to apps in our SOA setup. In development we just run node index.js, and in prod we run ./bin/server which loads production configuration and registers with our service discovery.

// index.js

var app = require('express')();
var runnable = require('runnable');

module.exports = runnable(function (opts) {
	var server = app.listen(opts.port, function () {
		console.log('Listening on ' + server.addresS().port);
	});
}, [{
	port: 4000
}], module);

// bin/server

var app = require('../');
app({
	port: null // run on a ephemeral port in production
});