Two failures of scripts/build.mjs did not say what to change. `node scripts/build.mjs --outt /some/dir` ignored
the misspelt flag, exited 0 and replaced the tracked dist/. Without devDependencies (npm install --omit=dev in a
clone runs "prepare") the script died with a stack trace, because typescript was resolved at module level,
outside the try block.
The script now takes no arguments or `--out <dir>` and answers anything else with one line and the usage, exit 1.
A missing compiler gives "build: typescript is not installed: run npm install (it is a devDependency)". The body
moved into build(args), so the staging directory and the compiler path are no longer module-level variables.
Two tests on a temporary package: three refused argument lists, and a package without node_modules; both compare
the package before and after. No change to dist/. npm test: 30 pass in 9.5-10.2 s (load average 7 on 4 cores).
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
The staging directory was dist/.build-XXXXXX. A build that is killed cannot remove it, the next build removed
only its own, and "files": ["dist"] put the leftover into the npm tarball. .gitignore hid it from git status and
the freshness test skipped every name starting with ".build-", so nothing reported it.
The staging directory is now .dist-staging beside the output (.<name>-staging for --out <dir>) and is cleared at
the start of each build. The freshness test no longer skips anything: a stray file under dist/ fails it.
Checked in a scratch copy: a build stopped with SIGKILL after 1.5 s leaves .dist-staging/ and an unchanged dist/;
npm pack lists 36 files, none from the staging directory; the next build removes it. New test for the same on a
temporary package. npm test: 28 pass in 8.2-9.5 s.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
scripts/build.mjs and its commit message state that a failed build does not touch dist/. That held when checked by
hand, and no test covered it, so a later change to the swap could break it unnoticed.
test/build.test.js runs a copy of the script in a temporary package with one source file and the dist/ of an
earlier build, and compares every file and directory of that package before and after. Two cases: a type error
(the first compiler run fails, TS2322) and "export =" (CommonJS compiles, the ES module run fails with TS1203, so
the staging directory already holds cjs/ and types/).
Checked in a scratch copy: with the cleanup of the staging directory removed both tests fail; with cjs/ and types/
swapped in before the ES module run the second one fails. npm test: 27 pass in 5.7 s.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
