parcel: Environment variables are not updated

🐛 bug report

I’m using dotenv to load environment variables from a .env file ; that’s convenient to change their value quickly. Though, right now I always need to restart parcel in order to have them changed inside the bundle.

🎛 Configuration (.babelrc, package.json, cli command)

parcel watch server/index.js -d dist/server --target=node

🤔 Expected Behavior

The bundle should contain updated environment variables.

😯 Current Behavior

Only environment variables from when parcel was launched are alive.

💁 Possible Solution

Maybe don’t cache env vars ?

🌍 Your Environment

Software	Version(s)
Parcel	latest of 1.8.x
Node	8 LTS
npm/Yarn	latest npm
Operating System	`Linux ce3280140caf 4.9.87-linuxkit-aufs #1 SMP Wed Mar 14 15:12:16 UTC 2018 x86_64 GNU/Linux`

About this issue

Original URL
State: closed
Created 6 years ago
Reactions: 6
Comments: 27 (10 by maintainers)

Most upvoted comments

We should probably add the env variables to the cache key

DeMoorJasper on Jul 11, 2018

Hum. Not for me.

index.html

<script src="./index.js"></script>

index.js

console.log(process.env.FOO)

cmd

> rm -rf .parcel-cache dist
> FOO=bar parcel build src/index.html --cache-dir .parcel-cache
> http-server dist

✨  Built in 23.04s.

dist/src.050c5e28.map        ⚠️  5.67 MB     338ms
dist/src.050c5e28.js          ⚠️  1.9 MB    22.16s
dist/src.6a665fea.css          23.09 KB     6.17s
dist/favicon.8d872578.ico      16.56 KB     307ms
dist/index.html                   535 B     460ms

result

// bar

Now change it

cmd

^Chttp-server stopped.
> FOO=something parcel build src/index.html --cache-dir .parcel-cache
> http-server dist

✨  Built in 1.91s.

dist/src.050c5e28.map        ⚠️  5.67 MB    376ms
dist/src.050c5e28.js          ⚠️  1.9 MB    1.36s
dist/src.6a665fea.css          23.09 KB     36ms
dist/favicon.8d872578.ico      16.56 KB     16ms
dist/index.html                   535 B      9ms

Wrong result

// bar

Now try with a .env file

.env

FOO=something_else

cmd

^Chttp-server stopped.
> parcel build src/index.html --cache-dir .parcel-cache
> http-server dist

✨  Built in 2.11s.

dist/src.050c5e28.map        ⚠️  5.67 MB    402ms
dist/src.050c5e28.js          ⚠️  1.9 MB    1.37s
dist/src.6a665fea.css          23.09 KB     23ms
dist/favicon.8d872578.ico      16.56 KB     21ms
dist/index.html                   535 B    278ms

Wrong result

// bar

NB1: mind the fact that the digest in the asset slug name did not change after the rebuild NB2: dotenv or inline environment variables changes nothing

cyrilchapon on Mar 6, 2019

In case its help to anyone having similar issues, we had to update our babel.config and specifically tell transform-inline-environment-variables to exclude which env vars we didn’t want to be inlined (and therefor cached).

  plugins: [
    ['transform-inline-environment-variables', {
      'exclude': ['VARIABLE_ONE', 'VARIABLE_TWO'],
    }],
  ]

alex-klock on Nov 3, 2020

I may take an hour to contribute on this, @DeMoorJasper @mischnic can you point me to the right direction to “add that environment change to the cache key ?”

EDIT: I found this old issue #66, resolved with this PR #521, merged in this commit #6c3d34f, and integrated inside 1.5.0

This seems like a regression then ?

cyrilchapon on Mar 6, 2019