README.md

GitHub Pages doesn’t support routers that use the HTML5 `pushState` history API under the hood (for example, React Router using `browserHistory`). This is because when there is a fresh page load for a url like `http://user.github.io/todomvc/todos/42`, where `/todos/42` is a frontend route, the GitHub Pages server returns 404 because it knows nothing of `/todos/42`. If you want to add a router to a project hosted on GitHub Pages, here are a couple of solutions:

* You could switch from using HTML5 history API to routing with hashes. If you use React Router, you can switch to `hashHistory` for this effect, but the URL will be longer and more verbose (for example, `http://user.github.io/todomvc/#/todos/42?_k=yknaj`). [Read more](https://reacttraining.com/react-router/web/api/Router) about different history implementations in React Router.
* Alternatively, you can use a trick to teach GitHub Pages to handle 404 by redirecting to your `index.html` page with a special redirect parameter. You would need to add a `404.html` file with the redirection code to the `build` folder before deploying your project, and you’ll need to add code handling the redirect parameter to `index.html`. You can find a detailed explanation of this technique [in this guide](https://github.com/rafrex/spa-github-pages).

### [Heroku](https://www.heroku.com/)

Use the [Heroku Buildpack for Create React App](https://github.com/mars/create-react-app-buildpack).<br>
You can find instructions in [Deploying React with Zero Configuration](https://blog.heroku.com/deploying-react-with-zero-configuration).

#### Resolving Heroku Deployment Errors

Sometimes `npm run build` works locally but fails during deploy via Heroku. Following are the most common cases.

##### "Module not found: Error: Cannot resolve 'file' or 'directory'"

If you get something like this:

```
remote: Failed to create a production build. Reason:
remote: Module not found: Error: Cannot resolve 'file' or 'directory'
MyDirectory in /tmp/build_1234/src
```

It means you need to ensure that the lettercase of the file or directory you `import` matches the one you see on your filesystem or on GitHub.

This is important because Linux (the operating system used by Heroku) is case sensitive. So `MyDirectory` and `mydirectory` are two distinct directories and thus, even though the project builds locally, the difference in case breaks the `import` statements on Heroku remotes.

##### "Could not find a required file."

If you exclude or ignore necessary files from the package you will see a error similar this one:

```
remote: Could not find a required file.
remote:   Name: `index.html`
remote:   Searched in: /tmp/build_a2875fc163b209225122d68916f1d4df/public
remote:
remote: npm ERR! Linux 3.13.0-105-generic
remote: npm ERR! argv "/tmp/build_a2875fc163b209225122d68916f1d4df/.heroku/node/bin/node" "/tmp/build_a2875fc163b209225122d68916f1d4df/.heroku/node/bin/npm" "run" "build"
```

In this case, ensure that the file is there with the proper lettercase and that’s not ignored on your local `.gitignore` or `~/.gitignore_global`.

### [Netlify](https://www.netlify.com/)

**To do a manual deploy to Netlify’s CDN:**

```sh
npm install netlify-cli
netlify deploy
```

Choose `build` as the path to deploy.

**To setup continuous delivery:**

With this setup Netlify will build and deploy when you push to git or open a pull request:

1. [Start a new netlify project](https://app.netlify.com/signup)
2. Pick your Git hosting service and select your repository
3. Click `Build your site`

**Support for client-side routing:**

To support `pushState`, make sure to create a `public/_redirects` file with the following rewrite rules:

```
/*  /index.html  200
```

When you build the project, Create React App will place the `public` folder contents into the build output.

### [Now](https://zeit.co/now)

Now offers a zero-configuration single-command deployment. You can use `now` to deploy your app for free.

1. Install the `now` command-line tool either via the recommended [desktop tool](https://zeit.co/download) or via node with `npm install -g now`.

2. Build your app by running `npm run build`.

3. Move into the build directory by running `cd build`.

4. Run `now --name your-project-name` from within the build directory. You will see a **now.sh** URL in your output like this:

    ```
    > Ready! https://your-project-name-tpspyhtdtk.now.sh (copied to clipboard)
    ```

    Paste that URL into your browser when the build is complete, and you will see your deployed app.

Details are available in [this article.](https://zeit.co/blog/unlimited-static)

### [S3](https://aws.amazon.com/s3) and [CloudFront](https://aws.amazon.com/cloudfront/)

See this [blog post](https://medium.com/@omgwtfmarc/deploying-create-react-app-to-s3-or-cloudfront-48dae4ce0af) on how to deploy your React app to Amazon Web Services S3 and CloudFront.

### [Surge](https://surge.sh/)

Install the Surge CLI if you haven’t already by running `npm install -g surge`. Run the `surge` command and log in you or create a new account.

When asked about the project path, make sure to specify the `build` folder, for example:

```sh
       project path: /path/to/project/build
```

Note that in order to support routers that use HTML5 `pushState` API, you may want to rename the `index.html` in your build folder to `200.html` before deploying to Surge. This [ensures that every URL falls back to that file](https://surge.sh/help/adding-a-200-page-for-client-side-routing).

## Advanced Configuration

You can adjust various development and production settings by setting environment variables in your shell or with [.env](#adding-development-environment-variables-in-env).

Variable | Development | Production | Usage
:--- | :---: | :---: | :---
BROWSER | :white_check_mark: | :x: | By default, Create React App will open the default system browser, favoring Chrome on macOS. Specify a [browser](https://github.com/sindresorhus/opn#app) to override this behavior, or set it to `none` to disable it completely. If you need to customize the way the browser is launched, you can specify a node script instead. Any arguments passed to `npm start` will also be passed to this script, and the url where your app is served will be the last argument. Your script's file name must have the `.js` extension.
HOST | :white_check_mark: | :x: | By default, the development web server binds to `localhost`. You may use this variable to specify a different host.
PORT | :white_check_mark: | :x: | By default, the development web server will attempt to listen on port 3000 or prompt you to attempt the next available port. You may use this variable to specify a different port.
HTTPS | :white_check_mark: | :x: | When set to `true`, Create React App will run the development server in `https` mode.
PUBLIC_URL | :x: | :white_check_mark: | Create React App assumes your application is hosted at the serving web server's root or a subpath as specified in [`package.json` (`homepage`)](#building-for-relative-paths). Normally, Create React App ignores the hostname. You may use this variable to force assets to be referenced verbatim to the url you provide (hostname included). This may be particularly useful when using a CDN to host your application.
CI | :large_orange_diamond: | :white_check_mark: | When set to `true`, Create React App treats warnings as failures in the build. It also makes the test runner non-watching. Most CIs set this flag by default.
REACT_EDITOR | :white_check_mark: | :x: | When an app crashes in development, you will see an error overlay with clickable stack trace. When you click on it, Create React App will try to determine the editor you are using based on currently running processes, and open the relevant source file. You can [send a pull request to detect your editor of choice](https://github.com/facebookincubator/create-react-app/issues/2636). Setting this environment variable overrides the automatic detection. If you do it, make sure your systems [PATH](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PATH_(variable)) environment variable points to your editor’s bin folder.
CHOKIDAR_USEPOLLING | :white_check_mark: | :x: | When set to `true`, the watcher runs in polling mode, as necessary inside a VM. Use this option if `npm start` isn't detecting changes.
GENERATE_SOURCEMAP | :x: | :white_check_mark: | When set to `false`, source maps are not generated for a production build. This solves OOM issues on some smaller machines.

## Troubleshooting

### `npm start` doesn’t detect changes

When you save a file while `npm start` is running, the browser should refresh with the updated code.<br>
If this doesn’t happen, try one of the following workarounds:

* If your project is in a Dropbox folder, try moving it out.
* If the watcher doesn’t see a file called `index.js` and you’re referencing it by the folder name, you [need to restart the watcher](https://github.com/facebookincubator/create-react-app/issues/1164) due to a Webpack bug.
* Some editors like Vim and IntelliJ have a “safe write” feature that currently breaks the watcher. You will need to disable it. Follow the instructions in [“Adjusting Your Text Editor”](https://webpack.js.org/guides/development/#adjusting-your-text-editor).
* If your project path contains parentheses, try moving the project to a path without them. This is caused by a [Webpack watcher bug](https://github.com/webpack/watchpack/issues/42).
* On Linux and macOS, you might need to [tweak system settings](https://webpack.github.io/docs/troubleshooting.html#not-enough-watchers) to allow more watchers.
* If the project runs inside a virtual machine such as (a Vagrant provisioned) VirtualBox, create an `.env` file in your project directory if it doesn’t exist, and add `CHOKIDAR_USEPOLLING=true` to it. This ensures that the next time you run `npm start`, the watcher uses the polling mode, as necessary inside a VM.

If none of these solutions help please leave a comment [in this thread](https://github.com/facebookincubator/create-react-app/issues/659).

### `npm test` hangs on macOS Sierra

If you run `npm test` and the console gets stuck after printing `react-scripts test --env=jsdom` to the console there might be a problem with your [Watchman](https://facebook.github.io/watchman/) installation as described in [facebookincubator/create-react-app#713](https://github.com/facebookincubator/create-react-app/issues/713).

We recommend deleting `node_modules` in your project and running `npm install` (or `yarn` if you use it) first. If it doesn't help, you can try one of the numerous workarounds mentioned in these issues:

* [facebook/jest#1767](https://github.com/facebook/jest/issues/1767)
* [facebook/watchman#358](https://github.com/facebook/watchman/issues/358)
* [ember-cli/ember-cli#6259](https://github.com/ember-cli/ember-cli/issues/6259)

It is reported that installing Watchman 4.7.0 or newer fixes the issue. If you use [Homebrew](http://brew.sh/), you can run these commands to update it:

```
watchman shutdown-server
brew update
brew reinstall watchman
```

You can find [other installation methods](https://facebook.github.io/watchman/docs/install.html#build-install) on the Watchman documentation page.

If this still doesn’t help, try running `launchctl unload -F ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.github.facebook.watchman.plist`.

There are also reports that *uninstalling* Watchman fixes the issue. So if nothing else helps, remove it from your system and try again.

### `npm run build` exits too early

It is reported that `npm run build` can fail on machines with limited memory and no swap space, which is common in cloud environments. Even with small projects this command can increase RAM usage in your system by hundreds of megabytes, so if you have less than 1 GB of available memory your build is likely to fail with the following message:

>  The build failed because the process exited too early. This probably means the system ran out of memory or someone called `kill -9` on the process.

If you are completely sure that you didn't terminate the process, consider [adding some swap space](https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-add-swap-on-ubuntu-14-04) to the machine you’re building on, or build the project locally.

### `npm run build` fails on Heroku

This may be a problem with case sensitive filenames.
Please refer to [this section](#resolving-heroku-deployment-errors).

### Moment.js locales are missing

If you use a [Moment.js](https://momentjs.com/), you might notice that only the English locale is available by default. This is because the locale files are large, and you probably only need a subset of [all the locales provided by Moment.js](https://momentjs.com/#multiple-locale-support).

To add a specific Moment.js locale to your bundle, you need to import it explicitly.<br>
For example:

```js
import moment from 'moment';
import 'moment/locale/fr';
```

If import multiple locales this way, you can later switch between them by calling `moment.locale()` with the locale name:

```js
import moment from 'moment';
import 'moment/locale/fr';
import 'moment/locale/es';

// ...

moment.locale('fr');
```

This will only work for locales that have been explicitly imported before.

### `npm run build` fails to minify

Some third-party packages don't compile their code to ES5 before publishing to npm. This often causes problems in the ecosystem because neither browsers (except for most modern versions) nor some tools currently support all ES6 features. We recommend to publish code on npm as ES5 at least for a few more years.

<br>
To resolve this:

1. Open an issue on the dependency's issue tracker and ask that the package be published pre-compiled.
  * Note: Create React App can consume both CommonJS and ES modules. For Node.js compatibility, it is recommended that the main entry point is CommonJS. However, they can optionally provide an ES module entry point with the `module` field in `package.json`. Note that **even if a library provides an ES Modules version, it should still precompile other ES6 features to ES5 if it intends to support older browsers**.

2. Fork the package and publish a corrected version yourself. 

3. If the dependency is small enough, copy it to your `src/` folder and treat it as application code.

In the future, we might start automatically compiling incompatible third-party modules, but it is not currently supported. This approach would also slow down the production builds.

## Something Missing?

If you have ideas for more “How To” recipes that should be on this page, [let us know](https://github.com/facebookincubator/create-react-app/issues) or [contribute some!](https://github.com/facebookincubator/create-react-app/edit/master/packages/react-scripts/template/README.md)