Question

We’re building web app that uses RequireJS for modular development/dependency management.
We kick things of with the following:

<script data-main="js/main" src="js/libs/require/require.js"></script>

The web app also uses a third-party applet that is required for communication with a mainframe system. The applet has a callback function that executes once the api for communicating with it has been initialized, with the api object passed in as a parameter.
e.g.

/*
 * This function is invoked automatically after the Reflection session has 
 * completed its initialization. A reference to the JavaScript API is passed
 * in as a parameter.
 */
 function jsapiInitialized( api ) {

    return api;

 }  

Basically, the above needs to be a dependency for many of the modules within the app.

How can I make the above function a module dependency, so the api object is available to those modules requiring it?

Answer 1

It seems that you want to use asynchronous like define method for your API. To do it with require.js you’ll need to create a small plugin. As result you’ll have the following files:

1) myapi.js (API simulation file)

// this is actually simulation of your third party code
setTimeout(function() {
    if(typeof jsapiInitialized === 'function') jsapiInitialized('hello!');
}, 1000);

2) myplugin.js (plugin which handles your API callback)

define(function(){
    return {
        load : function(name, req, onLoad, config){
            window.jsapiInitialized = function(api) {
                onLoad(api);
            };
            require([name]);
        }
    };
});

3) main.js (to test your plugin)

require(['myplugin!myapi'], function(api){
    alert(api);
});

(where “myapi” can be a path to your real API script)