Fronton

A command-line tool for build frontend apps in Ruby.

It uses Sprockets and Tilt to creates an environment for assets compiling similar to Rails Assets Pipeline. It support all engines supported by Sprockets and Tilt like Javascript, Sass, CoffeeScript, Haml, Slim, etc.

Status

This project is still experimental, use with caution!

Installation

$ gem install fronton

Features

Support for RailsAssets.
Support for LiveReload in fronton server command using --livereload.

Getting Started

Available commands

fronton new: generate a new blank app with a default skeleton.
fronton server: start a development server for html & assets.
fronton compile: compile html & assets files for distribution.
fronton clean: remove old compiled html & assets files.
fronton clobber: remove all compiled html & assets files.
fronton info: show information about the environment.
fronton help: show commands help.

Config file

Configuration options are readed from a fronton.yml file located in project top folder. application.js, application.css and all non js&css files in assets_paths are already added.

assets:
  - otherfile.js
assets_paths:
  - assets/javascripts
  - assets/stylesheets
  - assets/fonts
  - assets/images
  - vendor/javascripts
  - vendor/stylesheets
  - vendor/fonts
  - vendor/images
base_url: https://assets.example.com
compressors:
  css: scss
  js: uglifier
dependencies:
  - rails-assets-jquery: 3.1.0
  - slim: 3.0.7
fallback_page: index.slim
output: public
pages:
  - index.slim: /
pages_paths:
  - pages

Attribute	Type	Description
assets	Array	List of assets to compile (non js&css already included)
assets_paths	Array	List of directories where Sprockets find files for require
base_url	String	Base URL for assets in production
compressors	Hash	Hash with selected compressors by type
dependencies	Array	List of gems to install and require
fallback_page	String	Fallback page (i.e HTML5 mode in frontend routers)
output	String	Path to a directory where compiled assets will be written
pages	Array	List of pages to compile
pages_paths	Array	List of directories where Fronton find html files

Gem sources

In order to allow Fronton to install project gem dependencies automatically, if you use gems from others sources than https://rubygems.org like https://rails-assets.org, you must add these sources to rubygems configuration file.

$ gem sources --add https://rails-assets.org

Proposed folders hierarchy

.
├── assets
│   ├── fonts
│   ├── images
│   ├── javascripts
│   └── stylesheets
├── fronton.yml
├── locales
│   └── es
│       └── index.yml
├── pages
├── public
└── vendor
    ├── fonts
    ├── images
    ├── javascripts
    └── stylesheets

Testing

Tests are written using Minitest.

$ bundle exec rake

fronton

Development

Runtime