Webpack-dev-server: Add ability to completely disable auto reload

[pawelpabich]

Do you want to request a feature or report a bug?

Feature

What is the current behavior?

There doesn't seem to be a way to disable auto reload: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/41797704/how-to-disable-webpack-dev-server-auto-reload

What is the expected behavior?

Add ability to disable auto reload so changes to files do not trigger automatic reload

[SpaceK33z]

Answered your question on StackOverflow.

[pawelpabich]

Unfortunately it did not work. I added my comments to the SO thread.

[analytik]

That doesn't work for me either. Every time I edit a meaningless comment line and save, I get [WDS] App updated. Recompiling... in the browser and it forces a refresh.

EDIT: Sorry, nvm. Adding a command line param didn't help, because webpack config overwrote it. Changing that config file helped.

[jk21]

hello, this is still not working for me! can you please help, how to disable auto-reload?

[Ghazgkull]

Can this issue please be reopened? We just upgraded to from Webpack 1 to Webpack 2 and this change in the latest webpack-dev-server is extremely disruptive to our workflow. We need to be able to work on our code without constantly causing our page to reload.

[analytik]

@jk21, @Ghazgkull - ~please try mixing this in with your webpack.config.js~

     config.devServer = {
        hot: false,
        inline: false,
    }

~Plus, if you have any custom components for hot reload for your framework (Angular, React...), remove or comment out those as well. Hope this helps!~

EDIT: Sorry, I just realized for that particular project where I tried this, we still had [email protected]. :(

[Ghazgkull]

I'm working around this using @pawelpabich's suggestion from StackOverflow:

1. npm install --save-dev null-loader
2. Add to webpack.config.js:

const path = require('path');
[...]
module.exports = {
  [...]
  module: {
    rules: {
      [...]
      { // Disable webpack-dev-server's auto-reload feature in the browser.
        test: path.resolve(__dirname, 'node_modules/webpack-dev-server/client'),
        loader: 'null-loader'
      }
    }
}

[jcrben]

Using webpack-dev-server 2.5 and webpack 2.6.1,

     config.devServer = {
        hot: false,
        inline: false,
    }

worked for me.

[Ghazgkull]

Based on @jcrben's comment, I just tried updating webpack-dev-server from 2.4.5 to 2.5.0 (with webpack 2.6.1) and the problem does indeed appear to be fixed.

[SLyHuy]

config.devServer = {
hot: false,
inline: false,
}

Worked fine!!

[aeroxy]

How do I add

config.devServer = {
  hot: false,
  inline: false,
}

to this

// @remove-on-eject-begin
/**
 * Copyright (c) 2015-present, Facebook, Inc.
 *
 * This source code is licensed under the MIT license found in the
 * LICENSE file in the root directory of this source tree.
 */
// @remove-on-eject-end
'use strict';

// Do this as the first thing so that any code reading it knows the right env.
process.env.BABEL_ENV = 'development';
process.env.NODE_ENV = 'development';

// Makes the script crash on unhandled rejections instead of silently
// ignoring them. In the future, promise rejections that are not handled will
// terminate the Node.js process with a non-zero exit code.
process.on('unhandledRejection', err => {
  throw err;
});

// Ensure environment variables are read.
require('../config/env');

const fs = require('fs');
const chalk = require('chalk');
const webpack = require('webpack');
const WebpackDevServer = require('webpack-dev-server');
const clearConsole = require('react-dev-utils/clearConsole');
const checkRequiredFiles = require('react-dev-utils/checkRequiredFiles');
const {
  choosePort,
  createCompiler,
  prepareProxy,
  prepareUrls,
} = require('react-dev-utils/WebpackDevServerUtils');
const openBrowser = require('react-dev-utils/openBrowser');
const paths = require('../config/paths');
const config = require('../config/webpack.config.dev');
const createDevServerConfig = require('../config/webpackDevServer.config');

const useYarn = fs.existsSync(paths.yarnLockFile);
const isInteractive = process.stdout.isTTY;

// Warn and crash if required files are missing
if (!checkRequiredFiles([paths.appHtml, paths.appIndexJs])) {
  process.exit(1);
}

// Tools like Cloud9 rely on this.
const DEFAULT_PORT = parseInt(process.env.PORT, 10) || 3001;
const HOST = process.env.HOST || '0.0.0.0';

// We attempt to use the default port but if it is busy, we offer the user to
// run on a different port. `detect()` Promise resolves to the next free port.
choosePort(HOST, DEFAULT_PORT)
  .then(port => {
    if (port == null) {
      // We have not found a port.
      return;
    }
    const protocol = process.env.HTTPS === 'true' ? 'https' : 'http';
    const appName = require(paths.appPackageJson).name;
    const urls = prepareUrls(protocol, HOST, port);
    // Create a webpack compiler that is configured with custom messages.
    const compiler = createCompiler(webpack, config, appName, urls, useYarn);
    // Load proxy config
    const proxySetting = require(paths.appPackageJson).proxy;
    const proxyConfig = prepareProxy(proxySetting, paths.appPublic);
    // Serve webpack assets generated by the compiler over a web sever.
    const serverConfig = createDevServerConfig(
      proxyConfig,
      urls.lanUrlForConfig
    );
    const devServer = new WebpackDevServer(compiler, serverConfig);
    // Launch WebpackDevServer.
    devServer.listen(port, HOST, err => {
      if (err) {
        return console.log(err);
      }
      if (isInteractive) {
        clearConsole();
      }
      console.log(chalk.cyan('Starting the development server...\n'));
      openBrowser(urls.localUrlForBrowser);
    });

    ['SIGINT', 'SIGTERM'].forEach(function(sig) {
      process.on(sig, function() {
        devServer.close();
        process.exit();
      });
    });
  })
  .catch(err => {
    if (err && err.message) {
      console.log(err.message);
    }
    process.exit(1);
  });

[xahon]

The most stupid thing I ever saw

[alexdunae]

For anyone still looking for this, you can configure webpack-dev-server in config/webpack/development.js, e.g.

process.env.NODE_ENV = process.env.NODE_ENV || 'development';

const environment = require('./environment');

environment.config.merge({
  devServer: {
    hot: false,
    inline: false,
    liveReload: false
  }
});

module.exports = environment.toWebpackConfig();

[kievsash]

Interesting if we can turn off/on live-reload in webpack-dev-server dynamically without restarting

[janakaud]

If you (like me) are concerned about the server capturing and recompiling all changes in the background - while it's not being used by the frontend (auto-reload disabled), try:

serverConfig.watchOptions.ignored = [/.*/];

where serverConfig usually comes from your webpack dev-server config file (mine, on React, is config/webpackDevServer.config.js)

Of course, with this, there's no need to disable auto-reload anyway - as the recompilation stops completely :)

[FrankFang]

@janakaud But, this method just stops the compiling job.

[janakaud]

@FrankFang that was the whole point - what's the possible use of the compiler running, when auto-reload is disabled (i.e. the compiled result is not being used by anyone)? 🙂

[kievsash]

The whole point is to be able to disable or enable it when it is needed w/o process restart (and w/o turning off autosave in ide)

[janakaud]

Well that's your opinion - neither the title nor the issue description states "to be able to disable or enable it when it is needed" or "w/o process restart"; rather, it says "to disable auto reload so changes to files do not trigger automatic reload"

In my case I just wanted to run the dev server with reloading disabled (launch, compile once, and keep on serving; so that every single tune-up I do in the code, does not fire a useless 100%-cpu recompile cycle); and that's easily achieved by the above serverConfig.watchOptions.ignored config change. Hope this helps someone who comes here, hunting for the same quest! 🙏