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Development Workflow

Project Structure

The repository contains several packages and apps:

  • nativescript-core - The core NativeScript TypeScript modules used to develop NativeScript apps. Produces @nativescript/core npm package
  • tns-core-modules-package - Base for generating the tns-core-modules package (compatibility package for projects that still import code from tns-core-modules).
  • tns-core-modules-widgets - The native widgets (Java and Objective-C) used by the core NativeScript modules. Produces tns-core-modules-widgets npm package
  • tns-platform-declarations - TypeScript definitions for Android and iOS native APIs. Produces tns-platform-declarations npm package
  • tests - Unit tests app for the @nativescript/core package. These test are executed as nativescript application on mobile device or emulator.
  • unit-test - Node unit tests. These test validate parts of the framework that do not require the nativescript runtime and so can be executed in node environment
  • e2e - applications and e2e tests
  • e2e/ui-tests-app - UI app used for manual testing and automation
  • apps - legacy apps for testing
  • build - scripts used for building and infrastructure
  • dist - construction site for packing npm modules

Working with the repo is organized with npm scripts, go and read through the scripts section in the package.json.

Managing dependencies:

  • tns-core-modules-widgets depends on:
    • no deps
  • @nativescript/core depends on:
    • tns-core-modules-widgets
    • (devDep)tns-platform-declarations
  • tns-core-modules depends on:
    • @nativescript/core
    • (devDep)tns-platform-declarations

Initial Setup

Clone (or fork/clone) the repo and run setup script:

git clone https://github.com/NativeScript/NativeScript.git
cd NativeScript 
npm run setup

Running Unit Tests Application

After the initial setup you can run the tests with:

cd tests
tns run android | ios

You can do changes in the test app and nativescript-core and rely on HMR to re-run tests.

Running the e2e Test Apps

There are couple of application used for development and testing. The ui-test-app is the more frequently used for development and validation. It is an ordinary NativeScript app that logs the test results on the go.

After the initial setup run the e2e apps with:

cd e2e/<app-name>

# Run the Android app
tns platform add android@next
tns run android

# Run the iOS app
tns platform add ios@next
tns run ios

Note: NOTE: do not commit changes in the runtime versions to e2e/<app-name>/package.json

Running Another App

TypeScript Applications

Link both the nativescript-core folders and the generated compatibility package (dist\tns-core-modules):

npm i <path-to-nativescript-repo>/nativescript-core --save
npm i <path-to-nativescript-repo>/dist/tns-core-modules --save

You can do changes in the app code and nativescript-core and rely on HMR to refresh the app.

JavaScript Applications

Use the same steps as with TS application. However, the configuration of JS application does not include loading and transpiling TS code. You need to transpile the TS code in nativescript-core yourself. The following npm script will run tsc in watch mode in nativescript-core (run it in a separate terminal so that you can do tns run in parallel):

npm run tsc-core-watch

Angular Applications

Linking tns-core-modules and @nativescript/core in Angular applications does not work at the moment. Check #7905 for more details on the issue.

Building tns-core-modules-widgets

You can the following npm script to build and link the tns-core-modules-widgets package.

npm run setup-widgets

This script will build the tns-core-modules-widgets package and link it inside the nativescript-core so it will be used for running the tests and e2e apps.

Note: NOTE: do not commit changes in the tns-core-modules-widgets dependency in the nativescript-core/package.json

Running Node Unit Tests

Run node unit tests with:

npm run unit-test

or run tests in watch mode:

npm run unit-test-watch

Platform declarations

To update the platform declarations (the ios.d.ts-es) you can run:

npm install
npm run dev-declarations

This script will update the iOS declarations. Android tools are not integrated yet. The declarations are generated from the test app and will include the native code from tns-core-modules-widgets.

Documentation API reference

The following will build the API reference pages in bin/dist/apiref:

npm run typedoc

If you want to improve on the documentation you can also build and start up dev web server:

npm run dev-typedoc

The terminal will point the address you can open in your web browser.