System

This is a CommonJS/npm compatible module system. It works both client-side and server-side in Node.js. For browsers, it supports refresh-to-reload debugging, as well as a build step compatible with Browserify to produce bundles for production. The System module loader can resolve both module and resource locations by module identifier across package boundaries.

In addition, System adds support for configuring module translators (text to JavaScript text), dependency analyzers, and compilers (text to module factory function).

Examples of usage

npm init
npm install --save system

To load in Node.js:

var System = require("system");
System.loadSystem(location)
.then(function (system) {
    return system.import("./entry");
});

To load in a browser during development:

<script src="node_modules/system/boot.js" data-import="./entry"></script>

To bundle for deployment:

bundle entry.js > bundle.js

Then to load in production:

<script src="bundle.js"></script>

History

This project started at Motorola Mobility with the work of Tom Robinson (@tlrobinson), originally called C.js. This became the foundation for module loading in Motorola Mobility's MontageJS web application framework, thus the name Montage Require, or Mr. Kris Kowal (@kriskowal) took responsibility for maintaining the library, converted it to use promises internally, and added support for loading packages installed by npm. Stuart Knightley (@stuk) took over responsibility for maintaining the library when work on MontageJS resumed at Montage Studio.

The System module loader is an iteration from that lineage, with a more focused scope, targetting npm packages more precisely, an interface more closely aligned with the proposed ECMAScript System object, adding support for configurable (per package in package.json) translators, compilers, and dependency analyzers.