Julius

This repository holds Julius, the user interface, and the nCoda app itself.

License

All nCoda-provided files are subject to the GNU GPL, version 3 or later. A copy of the license can be found in the LICENSE file.

Install

You need to install NodeJS and the NPM (Node Package Manager). This may be available through your distribution's package management system, but you can also download it from the NodeJS website, https://nodejs.org/ .

Then you need to use NPM to install nCoda's JavaScript dependencies. If this works, it's two simple commands. From the nCoda root directory, run:

$ npm install
$ npm dedupe

Note: You should re-run these commands after you run git pull.

The first command installs Julius' dependencies, and the second tries to factor out common dependencies between the installed dependencies.

We recommend running the automated test suites before starting development.

Optional: Install Watchman

The "devserver" script used to compile and run Julius takes advantage of the Watchman program to automatically recompile the LESS files when they are changed. Installing Watchman is optional. The "devserver" script will detect and use Watchman if it can be found by the which command.

https://facebook.github.io/watchman/docs/install.html#build-install

You must use the --with-python flage for the ./configure script in order to build the Python extension. After you build, switch into the "python" subdirectory and run sudo python2 setup.py install to install the Python extension.

We strongly recommend the --enable-stack-protector flag for the ./configure script for all users. This adds several compiler flags that eliminate a common set of memory management bugs.

If you do not install Watchman, you must restart the "devserver" script or run lessc yourself in order to recompile the LESS files.

Install Fujian and Lychee

Most Julius functionality requires a data source, for which nCoda's Lychee is the only known solution.

Clone the Lychee repository into a directory other than the the Julius directory, then follow the installation instructions in the Lychee README file. At the end of the installation process you should have these top-level directories all beside each other:

• julius
• lychee
• fujian

The Lychee repository URL is [email protected]:lychee/lychee.git

Run nCoda

Important: Start Fujian before you start Julius.

Open two terminal windows. In one window, activate the Fujian/Lychee virtualenv, then start Fujian by running python -m fujian.

In the other window, run the development version of nCoda with with devserver script for Python 3.4+. You can run it in three ways:

$ python3 devserver
# ... or...
$ ./devserver
# ... or...
$ npm start

Then visit http://localhost:8000 in your browser! It will take noticeable time to load nCoda.

Run the Test Suites

Run the Julius test suite with the npm test command. Run the Lychee and Fujian test suites with the py.test command. All test commands must be issued from the project's respective directory.

Development Workflow

Once you start Lychee and Julius in the way described above, the JavaScript files will be recompiled automatically when you save them. However, you can also recompile the CSS files automatically by installing the Watchman program as described above. If it is installed properly on your system (i.e., if it can be found with the which command) then Watchman will be found and used without specific configuration.

Troubleshooting Problems

It's a computer program, so sometimes it's just not going to work.

Cannot run lessc

When you run devserver you may see an error like this:

./less_autocompiler.sh: line 4: node_modules/less/bin/lessc: Permission denied

This probably means that lessc was installed without the "executable" bit set. I don't know why they would ship an executable that can't be executed, but it happens. To see whether this is the problem, use ls:

$ ls -l node_modules/less/bin/lessc
total 16
-rw-r--r-- 1 crantila crantila 16197 Sep 25 02:43 lessc

It shouldn't say "crantila" unless that's your username. But look at the permissions: -rw-r--r--. This should be -rwxr-xr-x so you need to fix it. Do this:

$ chmod +x node_modules/less/bin/lessc

Try running devserver again, and that error message should disappear.

Directory Structure

The "js" directory of the Julius repository is subdivided into three:

1. The "nuclear" directory holds NuclearJS stores, getters, and so on, which manage data flow.
2. The "react" directory holds React components, which constitute the user interface.
3. The "util" directory holds other modules, for tasks such as logging and connecting to Fujian.

Tests for a module belong in a subdirectory of that module. For example, the tests for js/nuclear/getters.js are in js/nuclear/tests/getters.js.

Build for Deployment

Use the following command to build Julius for deployment (production):

$ npm run build

This command builds a redistributable bundle for the build platform.