manage-htaccess

---

Enable or disable statement blocks / features within .htaccess based on some state from node.js

Example of use case

Can be used when developing stuff on non-webapp-dedicated LAMP server whlist using Webpack build system / module bundler and webpack-dev-server for hot reloading.

* When building for deploy: files for js, css, images, fonts etc. are spewed out in filesystem (i.e., http://devserver.tld/path/to/app/assets/site.js)
* When building for development: webpack-dev-server hot reloading is used - js is served by node.js on some port, css is inlined within js, images are somewhere in between (i.e., http://devserver.tld:1234/site.js)

This means that paths change (HTML asking for js, CSS asking for images etc.). A really simple proxying (or in this case just url rewriting) does the job.

This hack comments or uncomments tagged blocks in .htaccess based on what environment (target) combinations webpack is run for.

$3

``
/**
* Htaccess managing function
* Reference:
* @param {Array} Array containing objects that describe tags, their state
* @param {String} Path to .htaccess file
* @param {String} Special string (.htaccess comment) that is used for enabling/disabling blocks
* @return
*/

`


An example for webpack.config.js

`
'use strict';

// development by default
const production = process.env.NODE_ENV === 'production';
const staging = process.env.NODE_ENV === 'staging';

const webpackMyHtaccess = require('manage-htaccess');

webpackMyHtaccess(
[
{
tag: 'DUMMY',
enabled: staging,
},
{
tag: 'MYAWESOMETAG',
enabled: !production,
attributes: {
port: 1234
}
},
{
tag: 'MYOTHERTAG',
enabled: staging,
}
],
path.join(__dirname, '.htaccess'), // optional
'#%!' // optional
);

let config = {
entry: {
site: path.join(__dirname, 'src/site.js')
},
output: {
path: path.join(__dirname, 'abc/def'),
publicPath: 'http://devserver.tld/path/to/abc/def/',
filename: "[name].js"
}
};

config.module = {
....
};

config.plugins = [
...
];

module.exports = config;

`

Sample .htaccess config

`


RewriteEngine On

#%!
# Proxy assets in memory to webpack-dev-server when developing
# Disable during production
RewriteRule ^abc\/def/(.+) http://devserver.tld:1234/path/to/abc/def/$1 [P]
#%!

#%!
# Whatever
#%!

`

Example HTML/PHP file assumed to be at abc. In this configuration public/site.js will be found both on static deploy as well as hotreloading webpack-dev-server based on wether content of MYAWESOMETAG is disabled/enabled in .htaccess.

`














``

##TODO

This is really hackish straight forward way for a very specific issue. Make it smarter? Don't parse existing .htaccess file, but make it as a part of building system?