webpack / webpack/webpack-cli

[Feature]: Watch for webpack config changes in watch mode

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enhancement Feature Up for planning
Dominant language
JavaScript
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Forks
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Avg merge
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Merged PRs (30d)
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Description

I'm submitting a feature request

Webpack version:
2.x

Please tell us about your environment:
OSX 10.x

Current behavior:
I'm not sure if this was discussed before, but it's one of the pain point for me in webpack workflow.

When config / config's dep is updated — hot reloadable server (or watch mode) must be restarted manually. Usually this hot reloadable server is not stand-alone process, but part of the bigger task or even lives inside docker container. And in case of config related change — the only way to pick this up is to restart everything.

Expected/desired behavior:

It'd be cool if webpack could track such changes and rebuild everything from scratch w/o killing current process.

What is the motivation / use case for changing the behavior?

It'll make easier:

  • work on webpack config setup
  • work w/ loader's configs, eg postcss plugin's options (js vars etc)

Moved from https://github.com/webpack/webpack/issues/3153

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

No file or test is named; begin at webpack-cli's watch-mode entry point and inspect how webpack configuration and its dependencies are watched. Reproduce a configuration or loader/PostCSS option change in the stated webpack 2.x setup, then verify watch mode rebuilds without restarting the current process.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
javascript, webpack
Domain
build-system, cli
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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