A boilerplate to automate and ease the creation of Generative bigFunctions on bigf.art. This project uses webpack and webpack-dev-server to improve the development and deployment experience.
- provide a local environment in which you can iterate and use modern features from the javascript ecosystem
- automate the creation of a .zip file ready to be uploaded on bigf.art
You will need to have nodejs installed.
First, make sure that your node version is >= 14
Clone the repository on your machine and move to the directory
$ git clone https://github.com/art-dot-inc/bigf.art-boilerplate-webpack.git your_folder && cd your_folderInstall the packages required for the local environment
$ npm i$ npm startThis last command will start a local http server with live reloading enabled so that you can iterate faster on your projects. Open http://localhost:8080 to see your project in the browser.
$ npm run buildWill bundle your js dependencies into a single minified bundle.js file, move your files from the public/ to the dist/ folder, and link the bundle.js with the index.html.
Moreover, it will create a dist-zipped/project.zip file which can be directly imported on bigf.art.
Once the environment is started, you can edit the src/index.js file to start building your artwork. The index.html file is located in the public/ folder.
You can import libraries using npm or by adding the library file in the public/ folder and link those using relative paths in the index.html.
Any file in the public/ folder will be added to the final project.
bigf.art requires you to use a javascript code snippet so that the platform can inject some code when bigFunctions will be generated from your Generative bigFunction. The code snippet is already in the index.html file of this boilerplate, so you don't have to add it yourself.
During the development stages, the snippet will generate a random hash each time the page is refreshed. This way, it helps you reproduce the conditions in which your bigFunction will be executed on bigf.art.
It creates 3 variables:
bigFhash: a random 64 characters hexadecimal string. This particular variable will be hardcoded with a static hash when someone mints a bigFunction from your GTbigFrand(): a PRNG function that generates deterministic PRN between 0 and 1. Simply use it instead of Math.random().
The index.js of this boilerplate quickly demonstrates how to use these.
This is how Generative bigFunctions work on bigFhash:
- you upload your project to the platform (see next section)
- you mint your project
- when a collector will mint its unique bigFunction from your Generative bigFunction, a random hash will be hard-coded in the bigFhash code snippet
- the bigFunction will now have its own
index.htmlfile, with a static hash, ensuring its immutability
The Guide to mint a Generative bigFunction give in-depth details about this process.
Once you are happy with the results, you can run the following command:
$ npm run buildThis will create a dist-zipped/project.zip file.
If your bigFunction does not work properly, you can iterate easily by updating your files, running $ npm run build again, and upload the zip file again.
Finally, you can mint your bigFunction using the same project.zipfile.
Theses rules must be followed to ensure that your bigFunction will be future-proof, accepted by bigFhash, and behave in the intended way
- the zip file must be under 15 Mb
- any path to a resource must be relative (./path/to/file.ext)
- no external resources allowed, you must put all your resources in the
public/folder (sub-folders are OK) - no network calls allowed (but calls to get resources from within your
public/folder) - you must handle any viewport size (by implementing a response to the
resizeevent of thewindow) - you cannot use random number generation without a seed (the same input hash must always yield the same output). The
bigFrandfunction does a very good job in that regard.