Development Setup

This page is for contributors working on the GJSify monorepo itself. If you just want to use GJSify in your own project, head to Getting Started instead.

Prerequisites

• GJS 1.86+ (GNOME 49+)
• Node.js 24+ (only for node: runtime parity testing; not required for install/build/publish)
• GNOME development libraries: glib2-devel, gobject-introspection-devel, gtk4-devel, libsoup3-devel, vala, blueprint-compiler

On Fedora:

sudo dnf install gjs gtk4-devel glib2-devel gobject-introspection-devel libsoup3-devel vala blueprint-compiler

Phase D.7d retired the yarn dependency. The monorepo bootstraps via the committed packages/infra/cli/dist/cli.gjs.mjs GJS bundle — no yarn, no Corepack, no Node-only npm CLI needed on a fresh checkout.

Clone and build

git clone https://github.com/gjsify/gjsify.git
cd gjsify

# Install dependencies via the committed GJS bundle (no yarn / Node required)
gjs -m packages/infra/cli/dist/cli.gjs.mjs install --immutable

# From here on, `gjsify` is on $PATH via node_modules/.bin
PATH="$PWD/node_modules/.bin:$PATH"

# Build all packages
gjsify run build

# Run the full test suite on Node.js and GJS
gjsify run test

Common commands

gjsify run build      # Build every workspace package
gjsify run build:node # Only the Node.js targets
gjsify run build:web  # Only the Web API targets
gjsify run check      # Type-check all packages
gjsify run test       # Run tests on Node.js and GJS
gjsify run clear      # Remove all build outputs

Per-package workflows follow the same pattern:

cd packages/node/fs
gjsify run build:gjsify     # Build the package
gjsify run build:test:gjs   # Build the GJS test bundle
gjsify run test:gjs         # Run tests under GJS
gjsify run test:node        # Run the same tests under Node.js

Next steps

• Architecture — monorepo structure, build system and GNOME library mappings
• TDD Workflow — how to port a new Node.js or Web API to GJS test-first