Nodejs CLI to create SVG charts serverside

[harlantwood]

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.

No.

Describe the solution you'd like

I have a working prototype of generating an SVG on the server side via a new CLI functionality. It uses jsdom to fake a DOM, and then extracts the SVG string, outputting it to stdout, where you can (for example) redirect it to a file.

The current API accepts a few JSON blobs as command line arguments -- it's not really intended to be used directly by humans, but more by other programs. We could of course later add more granular options which could be more human friendly if desired.

Example of current use:

bin/astrochart \
  --radix '{"planets":{"Sun":[60],"Moon":[120]},"cusps":[0,30,60,90,120,150,180,210,240,270,300,330]}' \
  --transits '{"planets":{"Mars":[0],"Venus":[180]},"cusps":[0,30,60,90,120,150,180,210,240,270,300,330]}' \
  > chart.svg

( note that --settings '{some json}' is not yet in the prototype, but will be soon.

This command generates a standalone SVG that can be opened directly in a browser. Example SVG generated from the command above:

---

There are multiple options for how this feature could be integrated (or not) here:

1. Directly into this repo.
   • The current prototype uses tsm to execute typescript directly, which is useful only if you clone the repo
   • If we wanted to go npx (think npx astrochart --options ...) we would probably move to nodejs using the webpack transpiled output
2. In a separate repo that uses this one as a dependency.
   • This one is interesting if we want to keep this repo as purely client side, but still want the CLI functionality to exist elsewhere.
3. Not at all. If this is not of general interest, I'll just use it in my project, which would be fine 😄

[afucher]

hey @harlantwood this is a really good idea! 💡

About the approach, I prefer the 2nd.
If you want, I can create a new repo in the organization and add you there. Just give me a name.
Or I think that you can create it in your account, and once you think is ready, can transfer to the organization if you want.

WDYT?

[harlantwood]

Hmm just checking that you’re trying this with an npm org scope, not a github org?

[harlantwood]

FWIW this SO seems to point to it working with npm org scopes:

https://stackoverflow.com/a/58649605

[afucher]

yeah, I have the astroraw org in npm, if you check the astrochart package is @astrodraw/astrochart
but for npx it does not accept, at least I tried some ways and also look for docs or any other package that has this, and did not found

[afucher]

FWIW this SO seems to point to it working with npm org scopes:

https://stackoverflow.com/a/58649605

I can try this, but there is a comment in the answer saying that it also does not worked 🤷

[harlantwood]

Hmm maybe you did this, but the npx enabling code would probably have to be checked into the main branch to work. Can you link to your commits or PR?

[harlantwood]

FYI due to other things heating up, not sure I’ll be able to land this anytime soon, but will try!

[roabhi]

This is awesome. Being able to render chart server side opens a whole new world of possibilities in combination con swisseph. Any updates on the implementation of the feature?

[harlantwood]

Update: not expecting to have time to do further work on this, but for anyone interested, feel free to fork my prototype, which works great:

main...harlantwood:AstroChart:cli

cc @roabhi @afucher

[roabhi]

Hey dumb question. How do I fork your prototype?. I may have the time to work on this atm

[harlantwood]

Nice. Just head over to https://github.com/harlantwood/AstroChart/tree/cli - clone that repo or add a remote to it to your local repo - this work is on the ‘cli’ branch.