Unable to start webpack-dev-server

[webpack]

Unable to start webpack-dev-server

[jhnns]

It looks like you're not bundling anything. After the line Asset Size Chunks Chunk Names there are usually all modules listed that have been added to the bundle.

Is there a webpack.config.js file in your cwd?

[robrichard]

There is a webpack.config.js in my cwd. I added the option webpack-dev-server --config webpack.conf.js and it is running and building my files now. I can't figure out where to get the compiled assets from:

    entry: {
        'dashboard': '/Users/rob/projects/myProject/src/js/entries/dashboard.js',
        'internal/administrator': '/Users/rob/projects/myProject/src/js/entries/internal/administrator.js',
        ...
    },
    output: {
        filename: './public/compiled/js/[name].js'

Ideally I'd like to run the dev-server on port 8080 and access my assets in my script tag like this:

http://localhost:8080/compiled/js/dashboard.js
http://localhost:8080/compiled/js/internal/administrator.js

[jhnns]

That's where the --content-base comes in. Just run webpack-dev-server --config webpack.conf.js --content-base /compiled/js.

If you name your webpack config webpack.config.js you don't need to specify it via the command-line. Webpack looks for a webpack.config.js in the cwd by default.

Please note also, that you need to run webpack-dev-server in the public-folder if you want the webpack-dev-server to serve all files under public.

[sokra]

You need a config like this:

...
output: {
  path: __dirname + "/public",
  filename: "compiled/js/internal/[name].js"
}

and run it with webpack-dev-server --content-base public

Now you can access any file in public and any file that would be there:

http://localhost:8080/compiled/js/dashboard.js

[robrichard]

Thank you both so much for your help. I'm able to access the files now using @sokra's config example.

I am still facing one problem though. I am using webpack to compile the assets for a large multi-page site with about 15 entry files. It appears that when one file is edited, all of the entries are rebuilt, and loading the asset blocks for about 20 seconds until all of the assets are recompiled. The documentation mentions that incremental rebuilds are possible. Is there an option I need to use to enable this? I tried both the cache and lazy options.

When we were using watchify, it would take about 20 seconds to initially build all of the files, and about 2 seconds for incremental rebuilds when a single file is edited.

Thanks again for your help.

[jhnns]

With plain webpack incremental builds are usually available via the cache- and watch-option. Enable both in your webpack.config.js and run webpack --config path/to/webpack.config.js. Rebuilds should be way faster now.

The webpack-dev-server doesn't require the watch-option necessarily since it is designed for a development environment. But it seems like the watch-mode is only entered if options.lazy != true (which is probably a bug @sokra?)

[robrichard]

Thanks so much for all your help. With @sokra's latest changes, everything is working as expected.