Linux: Startup thread that launches node subprocess

[timburgess]

This is some initial work in getting the node process up & running in Linux.

With this code, brackets-shell kicks off a mutexed launch thread that starts the Node executable in a subprocess.
As per the latest linux setup script, Node is launched from brackets-shell/deps/node/bin/node.

A file descriptor in the startup thread is piped to STDIN in the subprocess.
I have experimented with passing input to the node process to eval(). This works but Node appears to buffer it's output if it detects that STDIN is not a terminal. If I run node in interactive mode i.e. 'node -i' it stops buffering but produces a lot more output than I think is wanted.

I'd appreciate getting some feedback on how to run Node as then I can add code to setup a pipe from the subprocess STDOUT to a thread that reads the output.

[jasonsanjose]

cc @joelrbrandt to see if he has any thoughts. Assigned to @jasonsanjose.

[timburgess]

I've done more work on this and now:

• both read & write pipes implemented to subprocess
• node subprocess starts and runs node-core & websockets established
• eliminates node-related startup delay of multiple seconds (yay!)
• node debugger working
• no more StaticServer errors in console & 'Log Node State to Console' works

node restart is yet to be implemented and there are probably more syscall checks required

[thefirstofthe300]

I noticed a problem with the node setup script integrating with @timburgess's node setup. Tim's node setup seems to call node from the deps/node/bin directory. The grunt-mac command that linux piggy-backs calls a rename of the node binary to Brackets-node and therefore causes the entire setup to collapse unless a manual copy and rename of the Brackets-node binary to just node is done.

I think @timburgess will either want to adapt, or the grunt script needs to call a copy instead of rename.

[timburgess]

Good point. When @jasonsanjose's grunt build PR goes into master, I will need to adjust to suit any path and or binary file name changes. At present, the code does run node from /deps/node/bin This is what the OS X build does but on OS X grunt produces a Brackets-node binary whereas the Linux script simply pulled down a binary named node. I have no issue with using the same structure as on OS X.

[jasonsanjose]

@timburgess the Gruntfile.js changes landed. Would you like to update this pull?

[timburgess]

Doing it right now :-)

[timburgess]

With @jasonsanjose 's Sprint 29 in master, I have rebased from master and made changes to run deps/node/bin/Brackets-node. Running this against current brackets/master, I get zero errors in the console on startup (first time I've seen that on Linux!). @DaBungalow Could you try this as well?

I have been working on an extension with node-side code so will do some more testing to confirm that it works on Linux in the same way it does on OS X.

[timburgess]

Tried a couple of extensions with node-side code. All works for me.

[jasonsanjose]

Fantastic! I'll try this first thing tomorrow.

[joelrbrandt]

@timburgess nice! thanks for your hard work.

[jasonsanjose]

Stale comments?

[jasonsanjose]

Oops. Nevermind, I see this is a placeholder for OS-specific preferences. I'll add a TODO.

[jasonsanjose]

Closing, see #306.