Dev: Go back to serve 6.5.8

[Mugen87]

Even with cleanUrls set to false, the editor does not work with the new serve. I suggest we go back to 6.5.8 for now which is recommended in the following post:

https://github.com/zeit/serve/releases/tag/7.0.0

We can still upgrade in the feature if serve becomes more flexible.

[donmccurdy]

Thanks for rolling that back, do you know what's breaking in the Editor in the newer version?

[Mugen87]

I have not analysed the problem in detail so far but for some reasons the server performed HTTP 301 redirects. So it was not possible to call http://localhost:8080/editor/

[Mugen87]

I'm in general irritated by the changes the developers made in the new serve. Going back to 6.5.8 is at least for now the best for the project and my stress level...

[mrdoob]

Thanks!

[donmccurdy]

Seems like that cleanUrls:false setting causes http://localhost:8080/editor/ to serve a directory listing, showing all the files in the folder rather than index.html. I don't see any combination of settings in the new serve that prevent foo.html from redirecting to foo, without also losing the ability to treat foo/index.html as foo/ as before. 😐

[mrdoob]

What do you guys think about switching to http-server? That's the one I usually use and it has never given me problems...

[Mugen87]

I'm fine with this.

[donmccurdy]

The original reason for the change is described by #12455, http-server has a bug that broke ImageBitmap loading in Firefox (http-party/http-server#296). It could also be fixed in Firefox someday, but I see no progress (https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1413806) and it's not obvious that Firefox was doing the wrong thing.

It sounds like the purpose of serve has changed, it now matches the Zeit Now static deployment environment, which is nice for static sites but diverges from typical static file hosts like GitHub Pages. I'd suggest:

a. Stick with serve 6.5.8 for now, and wait for a response on vercel/serve#431
b. Move to something else like live-server

[mrdoob]

I leave this up to you guys, I don't use npm dev nor npm dev-test.

I think it was @fernandojsg and @gero3 who introduced all this?

[donmccurdy]

I think it was @fernandojsg and @gero3 who introduced all this?

That was me, in #12455. Unless they (Zeit) choose to provide options matching typical static hosting behavior, maybe it's no longer a good choice as a development server. I've left some comments and I think there's a reasonable chance they'll address them, but we can certainly also use something else.

I'd welcome feedback from others on alternatives, if you have something you like and that provides directory listings. I generally use serve, but I also use Zeit for hosting so those "just work" together. budo is also good but does too much for this situation. live-server is the only other alternative I'm familiar with.

[fernandojsg]

I have no strong opinion although I agree that bude looks like too much for the needs of the projects, I've been using using live-server for a while and no complains so far though.

[donmccurdy]

Seeing some progress on the http-server issue (http-party/http-server#296), let's wait until either that or the Zeit Serve question are resolved.

[Mugen87]

Makes sense. The further use of serve 6.5.8 should be no problem. At least for the moment.