Interactive Package Search

[Brittany-Reid]

One of the feedback suggestions we received was to make the package search more interactive. This feature request will also resolve issues with the package table format being inadequate.

For example, the package being used to create the table leads to output like this:

The table just generally takes up a lot of space in an inefficient manner, it also is printed to the terminal at a fixed size, so cannot be adjusted (must call the package search again).

Using Ink (https://github.com/vadimdemedes/ink), we can create an interactive package search that a user can scroll through. I have already completed the prototype of this, implementing this feature would then require:

• Updating the prototype now we have our final dataset (what package information we want to display)
• Ensure that the interactive package search can be run from the REPL .package command and behave correctly.
• Ensure we can use the return value (selected package name) to install the package for the user.
• Test that this works correctly and that the new feature doesn't interfere with existing functionality.

[Brittany-Reid]

Interactive package search has been added. Because its interactive and uses asynchronous code, I had to add a work around before the command reaches the REPL. Previously, for the editor mode, I created a new process (as we may have wanted to run an existing editor instead).

I am starting to move repl related code to its own class so the main repl file is cleaner. The code between these two files is still a bit of a mess.

All the big code behind this scrolling menu is in its own repository: https://github.com/Brittany-Reid/ink-scroll-prompts, which is now a dependency of this project. I didn't want the 100 or so tests as part of this repo, and if we do any other Node.js project, I think it could be reusable. I will publish it on NPM before we merge, so we can use versioning.

The package search looks as such:

I haven't bothered to add in part of the prototype that hides extra details on non-selected items, as I want to try a more minimalist design that allows us to show more packages first. This design is pretty but there's lots of empty space. Maybe we could add more information, number of code snippets maybe?

You can press escape from this menu and the prompt will return, and the menu will remain part of the terminal history.

However, if you press enter, you will be asked if you want to install the currently selected package:

If you select yes, it will install.

Todo:

• Add some text about controls.

No new tests yet, but no existing tests broke.