How to deliver my software: CDN, NPM, GitHub
In this article
Want to share your JavaScript library? Get it out there with platforms like npm, GitHub, and CDNs. These places make it easy for developers to find and use your code.
Software production involves many stages, such as software design, software development, and many more. Software distribution is also an essential part of that process. It is like a logical continuation of development that determines where and how your end-user will get the product.
There are lots of platforms and stores offering themselves as a placement for your software. To decide whether to use this or another platform as a tool of distribution, you should certainly know who is your target audience and which platforms it uses most.
If you’re a JavaScript developer, you should research how JS libraries are usually distributed. You should adjust to customers and do everything so they can get your library in a way they usually get such software for their projects.
So, as a person interested in spreading the library, you should take two steps:
- Gather as much information about the most popular platforms for JS software delivery as possible.
- Do the appropriate actions so that the library becomes available on those platforms.
To help you with the first step, we gathered the most popular ways of JavaScript modules distribution.
Let’s start!
1. Content Delivery Network (CDN)
CDN aims to provide the quick transfer of resources needed for loading the webpage’s content: stylesheets, images, and javascript files. CDNs are becoming increasingly popular, and a significant part of web traffic is served through them.
Taking into account the availability of CDNs and the ease of use, we’re not surprised by their widespread acclaim.
Having your JS module accessible via CDN will not burden you, but bring many benefits to the users of your library.
You can start using CDNs with learning more about such CDN providers as Cloudflare, Amazon CloudFront, and Akamai. They are widely known for their reliability and quality of service.
How CDN may come in handy for the end-users:
- No need to download and copy files to a server, as well as no need to use some extra software like package managers.
- High availability and high performance in terms of loading scripts.
- The user’s application will automatically use the latest release of the library.
2. GitHub
First of all, GitHub is a perfect solution for open-source projects. Using GitHub as a repository gives you a community for the project. Thus, besides an additional platform for software distribution, you also get a bunch of people gathered around your library.
These people are an active network that can report bugs, fix them through pull requests, suggest new awesome features, and so on. It sounds like a good boost to your library’s development, isn’t it?
But even if your JavaScript software is commercial, GitHub is worth using. It can be an excellent option for promoting the library.
Does your library have any integrations with other libraries, frameworks, and technologies?
It’s a good idea to add different examples of such integrations to your repository. Thanks to these examples, people may discover your software when googling some related subjects.
Just a point to remember: GitHub is popular enough to be on the top of Google’s results, so you shouldn’t underestimate its power.
How having your library available through the GitHub may come in handy for the end-users:
- Easy software downloads and updates.
- In the case of an open-source project, end-users can take the source code and adjust it to their needs.
- GitHub is the right place to share different library usage examples.
3. npm registry
The public npm registry is a database containing different JavaScript packages used for different developing purposes. When you use npm or yarn, the package you download is fetched right from that registry.
Since npm and its analogs are quite popular in web development, publishing your JS library on the npm registry might bring the lion’s share of users to the library.
How having your library available through the npm registry may come in handy for the end-users:
- Allows installing the software by using npm, yarn, and other similar package managers.
- Easy software updates, as well as an option to stick with an exact minor version.
4. The NuGet Gallery
The NuGet Gallery maintains more than 200 000 unique packages for .NET developing. Like the npm registry for npm, it is the storage the NuGet package manager uses when downloading a library for your needs. Thus, if you think your library can be useful for .NET developers, you should certainly create a NuGet package for it.
How having your library available through the NuGet gallery may come in handy for the end-users:
- Allows installing the software by using the NuGet package manager, which is pretty convenient to use.
- Easy package updates and the option to stick with a needed software version.
Though we mentioned lots of software delivery options, the good old download link shouldn’t be forgotten. The download link, together with all the mentioned platforms, is an ultimate set for software delivery.
In this article, we described the most popular ways of software distribution, and we hope they will help you to spread your JavaScript library. So, go ahead and share your software with the world!
? To find more coding tutorials you can go to gitconnected.com.
