Stop publishing refl1d-webview-client to npmjs?

[bmaranville]

Currently we publishing the webview client code (compiled) to npmjs.com so that it can be served through free CDNs. The use case for this is for developers that want to work with the python library and use the webview interface, but without compiling the client code. The webview python server follows this logic when to serve the client:

• reads the current client code version from refl1d/webview/client/package.json (which is in the git source tree)
• checks to see if a client is compiled to refl1d/webview/client/dist/<version>/, and
  • if the folder exists, serves the index.html file found there
  • if the folder does not exist, serves a version of index.html that loads the client code from the CDN using a template
    (e.g. CDN_TEMPLATE = "https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/bumps-webview-client@{client_version}/dist/{client_version}")

Now we have workflows that compile the client code and include it in the wheel files that will be automatically published to pypi.org, so most end users will get everything they need with pip install refl1d or pip install refl1d --upgrade --no-dependencies if they are just wanting to upgrade it.

Can we live with the requirement that developers that install from source must compile the client themselves?

[pkienzle]

Setting up the client using the conda nodejs package is easy enough that we don't need the CDN.

The circumstances where you wouldn't need nodejs are very limited: You are either working on the documentation or you maintaining code that only touches the server.