Simple Live Server

A mininal HTTP server with live reload capabilities.

This project started as a stripped-down fork of live-server by Tapio Vierros. Modifications include:

• Support for polling-based file watching (which allows for usage in WSL and networked folders)
• Updated dependencies
• Port to TypeScript
• Stripped-down functionality (no support for HTTPS, proxying, SPA, etc)

Installation

    npm i -D simple-live-server

Usage

To serve local files:

    simple-live-server [options] [root-path]

On file systems where change notifications aren't available, such as WSL 2, polling can be enabled with the -p option:

    simple-live-server -p [options] [root-path]

For projects that require a build step, I recommend chokidar-cli and npm-run-all, e.g.:

run-p --race "chokidar index.ts -c tsc" "simple-live-server --watch=index.js"

Command line parameters:

• --port=NUMBER - Port use, default: 8080
• --quiet | -q - Suppress logging
• --verbose | -V - More logging (logs all requests, etc.)
• --watch=PATH - Comma-separated string of paths to inclusively watch for changes (default: everything)
• --ignore=PATH - Comma-separated string of paths to ignore (anymatch-compatible definition)
• --poll | -p - Use polling to watch files
• --header=HEADER - Add an HTTP header to responses (can be repeated for multiple headers)
• --help | -h - Display terse usage hint and exit
• --version | -v - Display version and exit

Usage from Node.js

const server = require("simple-live-server");

const params = {
    port: 8181,                         // Set the server port. Defaults to 8080.
    root: "/public",                    // Set root directory that's being served. Defaults to cwd.
    watch: ["*.js", "*.html"],          // Array of paths to watch for reloading.
    ignore: ["scss", "my/templates"],   // Array of paths to ignore for reloading.
    logLevel: 2,                        // 0 = errors only, 1 = some, 2 = lots
    poll: true,                         // When true, use polling to watch files. 
    headers: {                          // Add headers to reponses.
        "Cross-Origin-Opener-Policy": "same-origin",
        "Cross-Origin-Embedder-Policy": "require-corp"
    }
};

server.start(params);