Allow empty files array when extending config.

[pgraham]

Search Terms

I have found the following closed bugs that are related but not quite the same:

TypeStrong/ts-loader#405
#12762

Suggestion

I would like to be able to specify an empty files array when extending another tsconfig.json file in order to override a files array specified in the base config.

Use Cases

I have a base configuration file that includes all typescript sources, including tests, as well as a config file for local development:

tsconfig.json

{
    "compilerOptions": {
        ...
    },
    "include": [
        "src/**/*.ts",
        "spec/**/*.ts"
    ],
    "files": [
        "src/srv/config.json"
    ]
}

I then have a second configuration file for deployment builds that only includes sources. I also want to exclude the local config since an appropriate configuration file for the deployment environment is added by a downstream build step:

tsconfig.dist.json

{
    "extends": "./tsconfig.json",
    "include": [
        "src/**/*.ts"
    ],
    "files": []

However, attempting to compile using tsconfig.dist.json results in an error: tsconfig.dist.json:7:12 - error TS18002:

The 'files' list in config file '.../tsconfig.dist.json' is empty.

    "files": []

Checklist

My suggestion meets these guidelines:

• [+] This wouldn't be a breaking change in existing TypeScript / JavaScript code
• [+] This wouldn't change the runtime behavior of existing JavaScript code
• [+] This could be implemented without emitting different JS based on the types of the expressions
• [+] This isn't a runtime feature (e.g. new expression-level syntax)

[pgraham]

So I see now that this doesn't stop compilation and the output directory is as I expect. Maybe it would be nice to output a warning with a 0 exit code so that npm doesn't complain.

[pgraham]

So a little bit more digging with this. A non-0 exit code from tsc, in this case, prevents me from composing commands with npm:

{
    "script": {
        "build": "npm run compile && npm run assemble && npm run deploy",
        "compile": "tsc -p tsconfig.dist.json",
        "assemble": "...",
        "deploy": "..."
    }
}

In a setup like this, npm halts execution when it encounters the non-0 exit code from tsc and so doesn't ever execute the assemble and deploy commands.