Ideas around import_map tooling.

[reggi]

Forgive me if I'm naieve I'm not sure what already exists, please point me in the right direction if this is a non-issue or solved problem.

Because deno import maps don't chain recursively you can't really use them in modules unless the project also implements the same imports. This can be a pain.

I'd love some third-party scripts / tooling around this, and I'm sure others will as well here are some ideas perhaps projects will surface that already exist or this will guide people to what needs to be created.

It seems that import_maps serve two purposes,

1. make it more convient for devs to use a remote module
2. be able to change the dep of a dep (something that's broken upstream)

I think most of this tooling focuses on (1), but if someone upstream fixes an issue upstream I want that to be fixed for me too see eveningkid/denodb#348 (comment).

Deno adding multiple import_maps to deno.json?

Some of these tools become irrelevant if Deno just handles this out of the box. As of right now you can only have one import_map but we could make it an array? An array that supports urls? 👀

Potential Commands

Merge import_maps

Abiding by the one import_map standard then I think the right way to do this is to have a import_maps directory and save a snapshot of the current custom imports. Then new import files are downloaded and put into this directory. The tool then merges all the import maps and spits out a new single ./import_map.json. Errors occur if there's conflicts. This will allow you to "undo" a merge because all the files are separate, all you have to do is remove the file.

import_maps merge

Download single import_map

Check a url for ./import_map.json and pull into your project. The name of the source can be included via metadata file or in the json, and this allows the ability to revert / remove imports. The api could look like this:

import_maps download http://deno.land/x/example@1.1.1

Download project-wide import_maps

Scan all the code in a deno project, check all potental deps for import maps, download them all.

import_maps find ./main.ts

Replace map key with dep import_maps

This would go through the codebase and replace (inline) all the import maps with their value / url counterparts.

import_maps replace-map-key-with-dep

Replace dep with map key import_maps

This would go through the codebase and replace (inline) all the urls with their import_map key counterparts.

import_maps replace-dep-with-map-key

Show unused import_maps

This would give you a readout of any import maps that aren't being used.

Remove unused import_maps

This would remove any unused import maps from ./import_maps.json.

Import map local-file generator

You could just use the import maps to generate local files, like this:

This:

./import_maps.json

{
   "imports": {
        "lodash": "https://deno.land/x/lodash@4.17.19"
    }
}

Generates this:

./imports/lodash.ts

export * from 'https://deno.land/x/lodash@4.17.19"

Usage like this:

./main.ts

export * from './imports/loadsh"