Detect package.json changes without full cache reload

[websolutions-hamburg]

Hello,

I use new webpack.DefinePlugin to share variables between webpack.config.js and my TypeScript files. I shared also the version from package.json with the DefinePlugin. If I change now the version in package.json it will not be changed in the TypeScript files, because it is cached. If I use the environmentHash to detect changes in the package.json the full cache will be deleted and new initialized, what needs a lot of time.

Is it possible to detect changes in package.json and reset the cache only for this file, and not for the whole project?

[mzgoddard]

To get this kind of thing working you want to load the version without changing the configHash or environmentHash. The easiest option is to use yarn.lock or package-lock.json for the environment hash (hard-source defaults to those first before package.json), and to require('package.json') in your build instead of using DefinePlugin. You could use loaders to get the smaller part of package.json you want, like version.

Using DefinePlugin for stuff like this with the Defines changing because the version changes normally changes the configHash leading hard-source to use a new separate cache. You could manage configHash to exclude DefinePlugin. If you don't want to require('./package.json') directly in your source, you could use DefinePlugin for that.

new DefinePlugin({
  VERSION: `require('${__dirname}/package.json').version`,
})

Since DefinePlugin replaces defines with code you can use it this way so the config doesn't change.