LiveReload: Reflect CSS Changes Instantly, with No Browser Reload

LiveReload: Reflect CSS Changes Instantly, with No Browser Reload(livereload.com)

46 points by Bartlet 14 years ago | 29 comments

newhouseb 14 years ago |

Sigh, these sorts of things always force you to change how you develop and don't really work for mobile web dev. This wheel seems to been re-invented far too often.

Alternatively:

  sudo pip install watchdog
  watchmedo shell-command -w -c "make" -i '*/.*' -R

Where "make" is either for a makefile or some other build script.

And then just put live.js (from http://livejs.com/) as a script inside your pages.

This works anywhere with basically any stack (i.e. if you had some strange alien CSS preprocessor as long as it can be processed with a command you can use this), integrates into your normal build system and requires no browser plugins or proprietary binaries.

ELV1S 14 years ago | |

LiveReload should works on every browser that supports WebSockets. It should work on modern WebKit-based mobile browsers.

Live.js uses polling. It sends XHR HEAD request every second.

LiveReload monitors file changes using FSEvents (on Mac OS X) and inotify (on Linux). When the file modified, it pushes its path to the browser and reloads immediately.

benatkin 14 years ago | | |

> Live.js uses polling. It sends XHR HEAD request every second.

The horror!

andreyvit 14 years ago | |

Unfortunately it also spins up your fans and eats up your battery. (Also I've built the GUI tool when I got tired of firing up stuff in Terminal each time I start working on a project.)

newhouseb 14 years ago | | |

This depends on what platform you're on - if you're on Linux, it will use inotify which is event based from the kernel (and therefore pretty efficient) and I think they recently added the OSX equivalent.

benatkin 14 years ago |

I have a mac, but prefer to use just Guard and the browser extensions. Fortunately, that info is still available:

https://github.com/mockko/livereload

After all the time that's been put into the free version by others I wish livereload.com would have a prominent link to it. But I'm glad that the gem, which I don't use because https://github.com/guard/guard-livereload is easier to install, and the browser extensions are available under the MIT license.

jessor 14 years ago | |

+1 for Guard. I recently switched to Mac and couldn't get stock livereload to run with my rvm'd 1.9.2 system ruby. I'm happy to have found Guard, I'm running it with livereload and compass and love the streamlining.

andreyvit 14 years ago | |

I will have a prominent link to guard. The site is very much alpha and has been built overnight. My plan is to deprecate the old livereload gem and point people who want a free/command-line version to guard-livereload.

hejdadig 14 years ago |

Another alternative is https://github.com/mape/node-hotcode

Has page reload and doesn't require any project specific settings.

It is open source and works (web app using an iframe + path to watch) without altering development habits.

ComputerGuru 14 years ago |

I don't get it... how freaking hard can it be to hit F5?

I'm not trying to be snarky - I'm just genuinely surprised that no one has posted that they consider the need for "live refresh" to be wholly unnecessary.

I come from a background in C++ development where compile times range anywhere from a minute to a day, so I'm truly thankful for "instant compilation" of CSS and HTML via a single click of a keyboard button..... but I wouldn't ever dream that my need to hit the F5 key was hindering my development ability!

andreyvit 14 years ago | |

Genuine answer is that you might want to try a tool like MacRabbit's CSSEdit first, which applies your changes without even saving. You get used to seeing the result instantly.

My motivation for building LiveReload has been to get the same instant feeling, but with compiled languages like LESS.

bryanh 14 years ago | |

One use case is a browser in another display. Nice to CTRL-S and just glance.

glenbo 14 years ago |

The technology that drives this is undoubtedly very interesting, but what does this truly offer? What would be the practical application of this?

Are there droves of people who could benefit from constantly changing css?

Perhaps I'm just missing something rather obvious. If so, please help me.

Xavi 14 years ago | |

Quickly switching of themes is one reason why you would want to make it easy to change css: http://xavi.co/articles/jquery-ui-css-themes-hosted-on-cdn

I can also be quite useful during development. One cool trick to achieve something similar is to add a contentEditable attribute to a style tag: http://css-tricks.com/8618-show-and-edit-style-element/

andreyvit 14 years ago | |

Everyone who does web development benefits from this, starting with myself. Have your browser side-by-side with your editor, save your CSS, boom.

sixcorners 14 years ago |

Could just use Google Chrome and test your changes with this file:

C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\User StyleSheets\Custom.css

Every time it is saved the changes are reflected on all open webpages instantly.

ELV1S 14 years ago | |

You have to reload the page then. Also, copy the changes from this file to your stylesheet.

andreyvit 14 years ago |

Hey! Woke up this morning to find LiveReload on HN home page. Ask me anything, I guess. :)

peng 14 years ago | |

Hey Andrey, it's pretty awesome that you support Stylus. Do you think you can make this work with VM-based development? I'm working in VirtualBox Ubuntu but viewing my site locally in Chrome (OS X).

andreyvit 14 years ago | | |

I'd love to add GUI support for that, but there are more important tasks that would help many more people (like, polishing the Mac ver and making a Windows one).

For remote server use cases, I recommend guard-livereload. It uses my browser extensions and works really well on any platform.

dhx 14 years ago |

Epiphany (web browser bundled with the Gnome desktop environment) has supported a reduced version of this functionality for a number of years now. It's fairly easy to implement with the dnotify functionality of the Linux kernel.

uses 14 years ago |

I have good luck with using Chrome's CSS editor, then right clicking and hitting "Save As". You can keep working without reloading, and periodically save your changes back.

ELV1S 14 years ago | |

https://github.com/NV/chrome-devtools-autosave You might find this useful.

lean 14 years ago |

Look cool, let me know when there's a PC version.

benatkin 14 years ago | |

There's an open source version that's in ruby and runs on the command line, and likely works on windows.

https://github.com/guard/guard-livereload

https://github.com/guard/guard (has windows instructions)

andreyvit 14 years ago | |

On the other hand, there does not seem to be a way to contact a HN user unless you specify your email in your profile. Let's just hope “LR on Windows” will make it to HN home page some day too.

andreyvit 14 years ago | |

Sure, will let you know! (Some time early next year, I guess.) Meanwhile, as other point out, you can use guard-livereload on PC if you don't mind installing Ruby.