Why does CLI V3 overwrite my specified server port?

[tomadelaney]

Migrating my existing app from CLIv2 to CLIv3.

Issue:

CLI always overwrites my desired server Port 3000 with a random port in the 5xxxx range at runtime.

Attempted Solutions:

A)  Tried adding PORT=3000 to .env

B) Tried adding PORT=3000 to the shopify.web.toml files

C) Tried forcing the port number to 3000 by changing the backend dev script

from:

"dev": "NODE_ENV=development nodemon --exec babel-node server/index.js --watch server/" 

to:

"dev": "cross-env PORT=3000 nodemon --exec babel-node server/index.js --watch server/",

... but in this case, the tunnel is created at 3000, but the CLI tries to open a second ngrok tunnel, resulting in a 'you are only allowed one tunnel" error.

D)  Tried to preset an NGROK Tunnel and use --tunnel-url flag in the CLI dev script:

sudo npm run dev -- --reset --tunnel-url https://7ea4-100-37-157-53.ngrok.io:3000

... resulting in the flag being ignored -- the port is overwritten to 5xxxx

E) Repeated (D) with a Cloudflare Tunnel

... resulting in the flag being ignored -- the port is overwritten to 5xxxx

In all cases, the process.env.port is rewritten to a 5xxxx port.

Any thoughts or guidance would be appreciated.

Regards,

Tom

[BogdanM]

Hi there,

Have you managed to solve this?

I'm having the same issue.

Regards,

Bogdan

[tomadelaney]

Bogdan,

I did solve this last spring; with a bit of trial and error:

Note the proxy set in the vite config file, located in your front-end directory.

vite.config.js
============

import { defineConfig } from "vite";
import { dirname } from "path";
import { fileURLToPath } from "url";
//import https from "https";
import react from "@vitejs/plugin-react";
import { nodePolyfills } from 'vite-plugin-node-polyfills'
import dotenv from 'dotenv';
//import basicSsl from '@vitejs/plugin-basic-ssl'

dotenv.config(); // load env vars from .env

if (
  process.env.npm_lifecycle_event === "build" &&
  !process.env.CI &&
  !process.env.SHOPIFY_API_KEY
) {
  console.warn(
    "\nBuilding the frontend app without an API key. The frontend build will not run without an API key. Set the SHOPIFY_API_KEY environment variable when running the build command.\n"
  );
}

// Note for below: Change http://ITS-D25Q310QF8J to resolve to your host
const proxyOptions = {
  target: `http://ITS-D25Q310QF8J:${process.env.BACKEND_PORT}`,  
  changeOrigin: true,
  secure: false,  // changed from true 4-3-23
  ws: false,
};


const host = process.env.HOST
  ? process.env.HOST.replace(/https?:\/\//, "")
  : "localhost";

let hmrConfig;
if (host === "localhost") {
  hmrConfig = {
    protocol: "ws",
    host: "localhost",
    port: 64999,
    clientPort: 64999,
  };
} else {
  hmrConfig = {
    protocol: "wss",
    host: host,
    port: process.env.FRONTEND_PORT,
    clientPort: 443,
  };
}
console.log("48 hmrConfig: ", hmrConfig);

export default defineConfig({
  root: dirname(fileURLToPath(import.meta.url)),
  plugins: [
      react(),
    nodePolyfills({
      // Whether to polyfill `node:` protocol imports.
      protocolImports: true,
    }),
    //basicSsl(),
  ],
  define: {
    "process.env.SHOPIFY_API_KEY": JSON.stringify(process.env.SHOPIFY_API_KEY),
    'process.env.NODE_DEBUG' : "'development'",
    'global'                 : {
      "Uint8Array": Uint8Array
    },
    __BACKEND_PORT__: `"${process.env.BACKEND_PORT}"`,
  },
  resolve: {
    preserveSymlinks: true,
    alias: {
      //'node:stream/web': path.resolve(__dirname, 'node_modules/stream-browserify/index.js'),
      //stream: 'stream-browserify',
      'node:stream/web':'stream-browserify/index.js',
      'node:fs':'node/lib/fs.js',
    },
  },
  server: {
    host: "its-d25q310qf8j",  // Resolve to your host server
    port: process.env.FRONTEND_PORT,
    hmr: hmrConfig,
    cors: true,
    proxy: {
      "^/(\\?.*)?$": proxyOptions,
      "^/api(/|(\\?.*)?$)": proxyOptions,
      "^/qrcodes/[0-9]+/image(\\?.*)?$": proxyOptions,
      "^/qrcodes/[0-9]+/scan(\\?.*)?$": proxyOptions,
      "^/smp(/|(\\?.*)?$)": proxyOptions,
    },
  },
});

With the vite proxy set for your host machine, the rest of the Shopify CLIv3 config is straight-forward:

App-level shopify.app.toml
==========================

# This file stores configurations for your Shopify app.

scopes = "write_products,read_discounts,write_customers ....

Back-end shopify.app.toml

==========================

type="backend"
[commands]
dev = "npm run dev"
PORT=8081
FRONTEND_PORT=8081
BACKEND_PORT=8081

Front-end shopify.app.toml
==========================

type="frontend"
[commands]
dev = "npm run dev"
build = "npm run build"
PORT=8081
FRONTEND_PORT=8081
BACKEND_PORT=8081

===

Note: 
Shopify should publish a pattern with best practices for the CLIv3 framework,

including its move from webpack to vite.  Deeper documentation of FRONTEND_PORT / BACKEND_PORT  and how this all of this works with VITE would also be useful.  

I hope this helps you.

Regards,

Tom

[BogdanM]

Hey Tom,

Thank you for taking the time to provide all these details.

I'm sure this will be useful for someone.

Unfortunately it does not apply to my case, because my app does not have a JS frontend. It's a plain Rails app with view generated on the server side.

Regarding the Shopify documentation on CLIv3 it is indeed a lot of room for improvement.

Regards,

Bogdan

[will_kasel · Accepted solution]

@BogdanM & @tomadelaney it took me a while to figure it out, but when I did, well the answer was hilariously obvious. 

I am using node, but I assume you have a similar option for Ruby (or whatever language). 

The shopify.web.toml has the following (for my node app)

[commands]

dev = "next dev"

build = "next build"

All you have to do is customize the command to run here. 

[commands]

dev = "next dev --port 4000"

build = "next build"

[tomadelaney]

Will,

Thanks for the update.

I've since moved from Vite to the latest Shopify framework, Remix.

Remix is offers a great deal with its server-side rendering.

I am having some challenges getting the remiox platform to perform well

with Shopify's redirect helper, however I do believe these issues will be sorted

out over time.

Regards,

Tom