generator-esri-appbuilder-js

Yeoman generator to help customize the ArcGIS Web AppBuilder.

About

This generator scaffolds out the boilerplate files that are needed when you are customizing the Web AppBuilder. This includes generators to set up your project and scaffold out the files needed to create custom widgets.

Getting Started

Installation

To install Yeoman from npm (if not already), run:

$ npm install -g yo

To install generator-esri-appbuilder-js from npm, run:

$ npm install -g generator-esri-appbuilder-js

Running the Generators

The generators should be run in the root of a working folder for your project. This should be outside of the Web AppBuilder's folder structure (i.e. NOT in the stem app or an app that you've already created with the Web AppBuilder). The grunt tasks configured by the generators will handle copying the widget files to the appropriate folders under the Web AppBuilder's install directory. Because of this, the generator will ask you what app to use. If you select None or do not have any Web AppBuilder apps in your Web AppBuilder install directory, the grunt file will be created but will not be configured to copy your code to the appropriate app directory. If you create an app after running the Yeoman generator, you can either go to the Gruntfile and make manual edits (you'll see details in there), or you can re-run this generator and it will offer to overwrite your Gruntfile.

App (Default) Generator

The app generator installs and configures the grunt tasks and other project files (.jshintrc, etc) and ensures that required subfolders (like widgets) exist.

1. Navigate into the root folder of your project
2. If you haven't already created a package.json file in this folder, run npm init (see NOTE below)
3. Run the generator with yo esri-appbuilder-js
4. Answer the man's questions!

Prompt	Description	Default
Type of widget(s) to be generated	Whether you want to build 2D or 3D widgets	2D
Web AppBuilder install root	The root folder where you installed (unzipped) the Web AppBuilder Developer Edition	[USER_HOME_FOLDER]/arcgis-web-appbuilder-1.3
Web AppBuilder application	The name of the application you would like the grunt task to sync your code with	None

NOTE A package.json file is not required but it allows the generator to save your dependencies in case you or other developers need to (re)install them later without running the generator.

Widget Generator

Scaffolds out the files needed to create a new custom widget.

1. Navigate into the root folder of your project
2. Run the generator with yo esri-appbuilder-js:widget
3. Answer the man's questions!

Prompt	Description	Default
Widget Name	Folder name for output files and widget identifier	MyWidget
Widget Title	Name users see in widget selector and panel title bar	My Widget
Description	What does this widget do? (optional)	A custom Web AppBuilder widget
Base Class	The widget's base class	my-widget
Run inside a panel	Will your widget run inside a panel?	Yes
Locale (i18n) file	Will your widget require a locale file?	Yes
Style (CSS) file	Will your widget require a style file?	Yes
Config (JSON) file	Will your widget require a configuration file?	Yes
Template (HTML) file	Will your widget require a template file?	Yes
Would you like a settings page?	Will your widget have a settings page?	Yes
Settings template (HTML) file	Will your settings page require a template file?	Yes
Settings locale (i18n) file	Will your settings page require a locale file?	Yes
Settings style (CSS) file	Will your settings page require a style file?	Yes
Which JavaScript syntax version would you like to develop in?	Will widget and settings JavaScript files use ES2015 or ES5?	ES5

Taking the default values for the prompts will generate the following output under the widgets folder:

MyWidget
│   config.json
│   manifest.json
│   Widget.html
│   Widget.js
│
├───css
│       style.css
│
├───images
│       icon.png
│
├───nls
│       strings.js
│
└───setting
    |   Setting.js
    |   Setting.html
    ├───nls
    |       strings.js
    └───css
            style.css

After you copy the widget files to the Web AppBuilder's stemapp, the next time you run the Web AppBuilder, you will see something like the following on the widgets panel:

Copying Widget Files

In order for the widgets that you're working on to be available in the Web AppBuilder you will need to copy their files to the appropriate folder under the Web AppBuilder's install root.

Copying the Files Manually

For example, let's say you've installed the Web AppBuilder in c:\arcgis-web-appbuilder-1.3, then you'll need to copy widget files to the following folder under the stem app:

c:\arcgis-web-appbuilder-1.3\client\stemapp\widgets

Also, you'll likely want to copy widget files to any applications that you've created that use them:

c:\arcgis-web-appbuilder-1.3\server\apps\[appId]\widgets

Unless you're using the grunt tasks, you'll need to re-copy the files each time you make changes to the files.

Running the Grunt Tasks

The easiest way to keep your widget files in sync with the Web AppBuilder is to run the grunt tasks. After running the generators, you can run the default grunt task following at the project root:

grunt

This will copy over any files that haven't already been copied over, and then start watching all files under the widgets folder for changes and re-copy the files to the Web AppBuilder's folders.

Linting Your Code

By default the app generator scaffolds out Esri's standard jshint configuration file. This should work well for ES5 files, however, it is not configured for ES2015 syntax. If you are going to use ES2015 syntax, we recommend that you use semistandard.

1. Install semistandard:

npm install -g semistandard

2. Below is a sample configuration you can add to your package.json:

  "semistandard": {
    "globals": [
      "define"
    ],
    "ignore": [
      "Gruntfile.js",
      "**/dist/**/*.js"
    ]
  }

3. Validate your code:

semistandard

See the semistandard docs for more information.

Issues

Find a bug or want to request a new feature? Please let us know by submitting an issue.

Contributing

We welcome contributions from anyone and everyone. Please see Esri's guidelines for contributing.

Credit

This generator was inspired by @steveoh and @stdavis's generator-dojo-widget as well as @dbouwman's generator-bootmap.

Licensing

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.

A copy of the license is available in the repository's license.txt file.

[](Esri Tags: web AppBuilder yeoman generator node) [](Esri Language: JavaScript)