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Check to see if dynamic import is a module in JavaScript/TypeScript

I am working on a ScriptManager class for a project that was created many years ago. The original code read scripts from a database, and these scripts are different depending on the customer and installation (the application is a desktop app that uses Chrome Embedded Framework to display web pages). The code would read custom JavaScript code and eval() it, which of course is highly undesirable.
I am replacing this code with a ScriptManager class that can support dynamically inserted code, and the ScriptManager is capable of loading code as a module using JavaScript's dynamic import() command, or loading code as pure script by creating a script tag dynamically in the document.
My problem is that there are many different possible custom code blocks in the database, and not all are modules; some will be pure script until those can be converted to modules at a later time. My code can handle this as described above, but I need a way to detect if the script code from the database is a module, so I can either use the import() command or insert a script tag if it is not.
I am solving this temporarily by making sure any module script code has "export const isModule = true", and checking this after calling import(). This works, but any code that is pure script still results in a module variable, but with no exports in it. If possible I don't want the other developers to have to remember to add isModule = true to any modules they develop in the future.
Is there a way to check that code is a module without having to do complex analysis of the code to check if there are exports in it? Since import() still returns an object and throws no errors if there are no exports, I don't know how to detect this.
UPDATE: Here are some examples of how this is intended to work:
// Not real code, pretend that function gets the string of the script.
let code = getSomeCodeFromTheDatabase();
// Save the code for later loading.
let filename = 'some-filename.js';
saveCodeToFile(code, filename);
// Attempt to dynamically import the script as a module.
let module = await import(filename);
// If it is NOT a module, load it instead as a script tag.
// This is where I need to be able to detect if the code is
// a module or pure script.
if (!module.isModule) {
let scriptTag = document.createElement('script');
scriptTag.src = filename;
document.head.appendChild(script);
}

So if you look here How can I tell if a particular module is a CommonJS module or an ES6 module? you will see I answered a similar question.
So the thing is Sarah, modules are defined by the way that they resolve. Module-types resolving differently is what, not only makes them incompatible with one another, but it is also why we name them differently. Originally Transpillers like Babel & TypeScript were invented because of differences in ECMA-262 Specifications, and the desire to support people who didn't have the updated specifications, as well as supporting the newer features for those who did.
Today transpilers are still being used, conceptually, much the same way. They still help us maintain a single code base while supporting older specifications, and features in newer specifications, at the same time, but the also have the added benefit of being able to generate multiple different builds from a single code base. They use this to support different module types. In node.js, the primary module-type is CJS, but the future lies in ESM modules, so package maintainers have opted to dual build the projects. The use the TypeScript Compiler (aka Transpiler) to emit a CJS build, and an ESM build.
Now this is where things get complicated, because you cannot tell just by looking at a module if it CJS or ESM in this situation, **you absolutely have to inspect its code, and check if it has more than one tsconfig.json file (because it would need at-least 2 to maintain a bi-modular build (which are becoming increasingly common with the turn of each day)
My Suggestion to You:
Use well documented packages. Good packages should be documented well, and those packages should state in their README.md document, what type of package/module they are, and if the package supports more than one module type. If in doubt you can either come and ask here, or better yet, you can ask the maintainer by creating an issue, asking them to add that information to their README.md document.

You can check that there are no export after import. In chrome import() added empty default for non module.
function isNotModule(module) {
return (!Object.keys(module).length) || (!!module.default && typeof module.default === 'object' && !Object.keys(module.default).length)
}
import('./test.js')
.then((module) => {
console.log('./test.js',isNotModule(module))
})
May be it's better to check source code via regex to check if it contains export
something like this
const reg = new RegExp('([^\w]|^)export((\s+)\w|(\s*{))')
reg.test(source)

Unloading lazy getters in boostrap addons?

At the top of my bootstrap.js I define a bunch of lazyGetters, instead of a JSM:
const myServices = {};
Cu.import('resource://gre/modules/XPCOMUtils.jsm');
XPCOMUtils.defineLazyGetter(myServices, 'sss', function(){ return Cc['#mozilla.org/content/style-sheet-service;1'].getService(Ci.nsIStyleSheetService) });
I heard that you have to unload imported modules. But what about "modules" that you create for lazyGetters? How would I unload those? Would I do a delete myServices?
If I do a delete on myServices which is a global, does that mean I should delete all my global variables on unload?
I read here: Forgetting to unload JavaScript modules in restartless add-ons
Forgetting to unload JavaScript modules in restartless add-ons
Another common cause of leaks is forgetting to unload JavaScript code
modules in bootstrapped add-ons. These leaks cannot be detected by
looking at about:compartments or about:memory because such modules
live within the main System compartment.
Also, when your add-on gets updated and re-enabled, the previous
module version that is still loaded will be used, which might break
your add-on entirely.
The following example shows how to unload your modules again
(bootstrap.js):
Components.utils.import("resource://gre/modules/Services.jsm");
function startup(data, reason) {
// This assumes your add-on did register some chrome
Components.utils.import("chrome://myaddon/content/mymodule.jsm");
}
function shutdown(data, reason) {
if (reason != APP_SHUTDOWN) {
// No need to do regular clean up when the application is closed
// unless you need to break circular references that might negatively
// impact the shutdown process.
return;
}
// Your add-on needs to unload all modules it ships and imported!
Components.utils.unload("chrome://myaddon/content/mymodule.jsm");
}
Note: Modules not belonging to your add-on — such as Services.jsm — should not be unloaded by your add-on, as this might cause errors and/or performance regressions and will actually increase the memoryusage.

The code you provided does not import a module, but defines a service getter, so it is fine.
(Aside: there is also a XPCOMUtils.defineLazyServiceGetter helper...)
However if you did something like this:
XPCOMUtils.defineLazyGetter(myServices, 'SomeSymbol', function() {
return Cu.import("chrome://myaddon/content/mymodule.jsm", {}).SomeSymbol;
});
then of course you'd need to Cu.unload() that module again. This is best done (IMO) by registering the module to unload as soon as it is loaded, so something like:
XPCOMUtils.defineLazyGetter(myServices, 'SomeSymbol', function() {
let rv = Cu.import("chrome://myaddon/content/mymodule.jsm", {}).SomeSymbol;
unload(function() {
Cu.unload("chrome://myaddon/content/mymodule.jsm");
});
return rv;
});
Other people just pro-actively unload all modules that could have been potentially imported or not. This is fine to, as Cu.unload()ing a module that wasn't imported just does nothing.
PS: You can still run into trouble when sticking something into another module, like.
XPCOMUtils.defineLazyServiceGetter(Services /* other module */,
'sss',
'#mozilla.org/content/style-sheet-service;1',
'nsIStyleSheetService');
In this example XPCOMUtils.jsm might still reference the strings passed as arguments from your code and hence leak your code. (Also, it is rather rude to stick stuff into modules that aren't your own and may create conflicts with other add-ons doing the same thing.)

TypeScript use typescript-require shared files

I use TypeScript to code my javascript file with Object Oriented Programing.
I want to use the node module https://npmjs.org/package/typescript-require to require my .ts files from other files.
I want to share my files in both server and client side. (Browser) And that's very important. Note that the folder /shared/ doesn't mean shared between client and server but between Game server and Web server. I use pomelo.js as framework, that's why.
For the moment I'm not using (successfully) the typescript-require library.
I do like that:
shared/lib/message.js
var Message = require('./../classes/Message');
module.exports = {
getNewInstance: function(message, data, status){
console.log(requireTs);// Global typescript-require instance
console.log(Message);
return new Message(message, data, status);
}
};
This file need the Message.js to create new instances.
shared/classes/Message.ts
class Message{
// Big stuff
}
try{
module.exports = Message;
}catch(e){}
At the end of the fil I add this try/catch to add the class to the module.exports if it exists. (It works, but it's not really a good way to do it, I would like to do better)
If I load the file from the browser, the module.export won't exists.
So, what I did above is working. Now if I try to use the typescript-require module, I'll change some things:
shared/lib/message.js
var Message = requireTs('./../classes/Message.ts');
I use requireTs instead of require, it's a global var. I precise I'm using .ts file.
shared/classes/Message.ts
export class Message{
// Big stuff
}
// remove the compatibility script at the end
Now, if I try like this and if I take a look to the console server, I get requireTs is object and Message is undefined in shared/lib/message.js.
I get the same if I don't use the export keyword in Message.ts. Even if I use my little script at the end I get always an error.
But there is more, I have another class name ValidatorMessage.ts which extends Message.ts, it's not working if I use the export keyword...
Did I did something wrong? I tried several other things but nothing is working, looks like the typescript-require is not able to require .ts files.
Thank you for your help.

Looking at the typescript-require library, I see it hasn't been updated for 9 months. As it includes the lib.d.ts typing central to TypeScript (and the node.d.ts typing), and as these have progressed greatly in the past 9 months (along with needed changes due to language updates), it's probably not compatible with the latest TypeScript releases (just my assumption, I may be wrong).
Sharing modules between Node and the browser is not easy with TypeScript, as they both use very different module systems (CommonJS in Node, and typically something like RequireJS in the browser). TypeScript emits code for one or the other, depending on the --module switch given. (Note: There is a Universal Module Definition (UMD) pattern some folks use, but TypeScript doesn't support this directly).
What goals exactly are you trying to achieve, and I may be able to offer some guidance.

I am doing the same and keep having issues whichever way I try to do things... The main problems for me are:
I write my typescript as namespaces and components, so there is no export module with multiple file compilation you have to do a hack to add some _exporter.ts at the end to add the export for your library-output.js to be importable as a module, this would require something like:
module.exports.MyRootNamespace = MyRootNamespace
If you do the above it works, however then you get the issue of when you need to reference classes from other modules (such as MyRootNamespace1.SomeClass being referenced by MyRootNamespace2.SomeOtherClass) you can reference it but then it will compile it into your library-output2.js file so you end up having duplicates of classes if you are trying to re-use typescript across multiple compiled targets (like how you would have 1 solution in VS and multiple projects which have their own dll outputs)
Assuming you are not happy with hacking the exports and/or duplicating your references then you can just import them into the global scope, which is a hack but works... however then when you decide you want to test your code (using whatever nodejs testing framework) you will need to mock out certain things, and as the dependencies for your components may not be included via a require() call (and your module may depend upon node_modules which are not really usable with global scope hacking) and this then makes it difficult to satisfy dependencies and mock certain ones, its like an all or nothing sort of approach.
Finally you can try to mitigate all these problems by using a typescript framework such as appex which allows you to run your typescript directly rather than the compile into js first, and while it seems very good up front it is VERY hard to debug compilation errors, this is currently my preferred way but I have an issue where my typescript compiles fine via tsc, but just blows up with a max stack size exception on appex, and I am at the mercy of the project maintainer to fix this (I was not able to find the underlying issue). There are also not many of these sort of projects out there however they make the issue of compiling at module level/file level etc a moot point.
Ultimately I have had nothing but problems trying to wrestle with Typescript to get it to work in a way which is maintainable and testable. I also am trying to re-use some of the typescript components on the clientside however if you go down the npm hack route to get your modules included you then have to make sure your client side uses a require compatible resource/package loader. As much as I would love to just use typescript on my client and my server projects, it just does not seem to want to work in a nice way.

Solution here:
Inheritance TypeScript with exported class and modules
Finally I don't use require-typescript but typescript.api instead, it works well. (You have to load lib.d.ts if you use it, else you'll get some errors on the console.
I don't have a solution to have the script on the browser yet. (Because of export keyword I have some errors client side) I think add a exports global var to avoid errors like this.
Thank you for your help Bill.

Conditionally require code in commonJS AMD module

I'm trying to write a cross-browser extension for Firefox and Chrome. Firefox uses the commonJS specification and Chrome just lumps everything into the global namespace like a webpage.
In order to be able to write reusable code, I'm trying to use requireJS to lood code in the Chrome extension, that way I can write commonJS modules and have them work in both environments.
I'm running into a problem when I need to conditionally require modules. For example, Firefox provides access to a simple-storage module which you should use to access the local storage. In chrome, I need to use the localStorage API that they provide. So, I've been trying to do this:
// storage.js
define(function(require, exports, module){
var store;
try {
// This module will only be available in the FF extension.
store = require('simple-storage').storage
} catch(error) {
// If it's not available, we must be in Chrome and we
// should use the localStorage object.
store = localStorage
}
// Use the store object down here.
});
However this doesn't seem to work. When I try to load the Chrome extension I get the following error:
Is there a better way to require modules with a fallback?

There are two caveats here:
1) Detect if chrome is running
// detects webKit (chrome, safari, etc..)
var isChrome = 'webKitTransform' in document.documentElement.style
2) Requirejs will parse the define() function and search for require('module') calls. To prevent the error on chrome you have write the require in some way that when requirejs parses the function body it does not recognize the call as a module dependency:
if (isChrome)
// use localStorage
else {
// set the module name in a var does the trick,
// so requirejs will not try to load this module on chrome.
var ffStorageModule = 'simple-storage';
return require(ffStorageModule);
}

Is it possible to use requirejs when modules may have to be removed to conserve memory

We develop an application in an embedded environment. It is a high level computing environment with a complete webbrowser on top of a busybox Linux system. The only exception is that the system has a limited amount of system memory.
Our application is built in JavaScript and runs inside a Webkit based webbrowser and consists of a lot of javascript modules that are loaded in sequence (Which is not very efficient).
Some modules provide common functionality that is used by several modules. We are in the process of converting our current javascript loader with requirejs, but there is one specific need we have to address first.
Is it possible to unload a module when it has been loaded using requirejs? Assume that we dynamically loads a module using :
require(["somemodule.js"], function(m) { m.run(); } );
That works well for loading and running 'somemodule' and also resolving all dependencies for 'somemodule' and the requirejs framework will store a reference to 'somemodule' for future requests.
If we at some point need to reclaim memory, e.g to be able to load and run an infinite number of modules, we have to start removing some of them after some time. Is that possible with requirejs without altering the internal implementation?
Has anyone dealt with this kind of problem before? Most single page JS apps runs in a webbrowser on a desktop PC where memory usage usually is not a major concern.

RequireJS does not have a built-in unload feature, but it could be added perhaps as an additional part you could build into it. If you would like to have that feature, feel free to propose it in the mailing list or as a GitHub issue.
If you wanted to experiment to see if it helps your situation, what you need to do is the following:
1) Remove the defined module from the RequireJS module cache. If you are not using the multiversion support, you can do something like:
var context = require.s.contexts['_'];
delete context.defined[moduleName];
delete context.specified[moduleName];
delete context.loaded[moduleName];
2) Then you can try removing the script tag to see if that helps:
var scripts = document.getElementsByTagName('script');
for (var i = scripts.length - 1; i >= 0; i--) {
var script = scripts[i];
if (script.getAttribute('data-requiremodule') === moduleName) {
script.parentNode.removeChild(script);
break;
}
}
Note that the module may not be garbage collected if another module holds on to it via the closure function(){} that defines that other module. That other module would need to be removed too.
You can try to limit that impact by not passing in the module as a function argument, but just use require("somemodule") inside the function definition whenever you want to get a hold of dependent modules, and not holding on to that require return value for too long.
Also, in your example above, for modules that use require.def to define themselves, it should look like this (without the .js suffix):
require(["somemodule"], function(m) { m.run(); } );

Try this: require.undef(moduleName)