Weekly Update - May 8th, 2015
Giovanny Gioyik (@Gioyik), Daijiro Wachi (@watilde)
io.js 2.0 releases
This week we had two io.js releases v2.0.0 and v2.0.1, complete changelog can be found on GitHub.
Notable changes
2.0.1
- async_wrap: (Trevor Norris) #1614
- it is now possible to filter by providers
- bit flags have been removed and replaced with method calls on the binding object
- note that this is an unstable API so feature additions and breaking changes won't change io.js semver
- libuv: resolves numerous io.js issues:
- addons: the
NODE_DEPRECATED
macro was causing problems when compiling addons with older compilers, this should now be resolved (Ben Noordhuis) #1626 - V8: upgrade V8 from 4.2.77.18 to 4.2.77.20 with minor fixes, including a bug preventing builds on FreeBSD
2.0.0
- crypto: significantly reduced memory usage for TLS (Fedor Indutny & Сковорода Никита Андреевич) #1529
- net:
socket.connect()
now accepts a'lookup'
option for a custom DNS resolution mechanism, defaults todns.lookup()
(Evan Lucas) #1505 - npm: Upgrade npm to 2.9.0. See the v2.8.4 and v2.9.0 release notes for details. Notable items:
- Add support for default author field to make
npm init -y
work without user-input (@othiym23) npm/npm/d8eee6cf9d - Include local modules in
npm outdated
andnpm update
(@ArnaudRinquin) npm/npm#7426 - The prefix used before the version number on
npm version
is now configurable viatag-version-prefix
(@kkragenbrink) npm/npm#8014
- Add support for default author field to make
- os:
os.tmpdir()
is now cross-platform consistent and will no longer returns a path with a trailing slash on any platform (Christian Tellnes) #747 - process:
process.nextTick()
performance has been improved by between 2-42% across the benchmark suite, notable because this is heavily used across core (Brian White) #1571- New
process.geteuid()
,process.seteuid(id)
,process.getegid()
andprocess.setegid(id)
methods allow you to get and set effective UID and GID of the process (Evan Lucas) #1536
- repl:
- REPL history can be persisted across sessions if the
NODE_REPL_HISTORY_FILE
environment variable is set to a user accessible file,NODE_REPL_HISTORY_SIZE
can set the maximum history size and defaults to1000
(Chris Dickinson) #1513 - The REPL can be placed in to one of three modes using the
NODE_REPL_MODE
environment variable:sloppy
,strict
ormagic
(default); the newmagic
mode will automatically run "strict mode only" statements in strict mode (Chris Dickinson) #1513
- REPL history can be persisted across sessions if the
- smalloc: the 'smalloc' module has been deprecated due to changes coming in V8 4.4 that will render it unusable
- util: add Promise, Map and Set inspection support (Christopher Monsanto) #1471
- V8: upgrade to 4.2.77.18, see the ChangeLog for full details. Notable items:
- Classes have moved out of staging; the
class
keyword is now usable in strict mode without flags - Object literal enhancements have moved out of staging; shorthand method and property syntax is now usable (
{ method() { }, property }
) - Rest parameters (
function(...args) {}
) are implemented in staging behind the--harmony-rest-parameters
flag - Computed property names (
{['foo'+'bar']:'bam'}
) are implemented in staging behind the--harmony-computed-property-names
flag - Unicode escapes (
'\u{xxxx}'
) are implemented in staging behind the--harmony_unicode
flag and the--harmony_unicode_regexps
flag for use in regular expressions
- Classes have moved out of staging; the
- Windows:
- Random process termination on Windows fixed (Fedor Indutny) #1512 / #1563
- The delay-load hook introduced to fix issues with process naming (iojs.exe / node.exe) has been made opt-out for native add-ons. Native add-ons should include
'win_delay_load_hook': 'false'
in their binding.gyp to disable this feature if they experience problems . (Bert Belder) #1433
- Governance:
- Rod Vagg (@rvagg) was added to the Technical Committee (TC)
- Jeremiah Senkpiel (@Fishrock123) was added to the Technical Committee (TC)
Breaking changes
Full details at https://github.com/nodejs/node/wiki/Breaking-Changes#200-from-1x
- V8 upgrade to 4.2, minor changes to C++ API
os.tmpdir()
is now cross-platform consistent and will no longer returns a path with a trailing slash on any platform- While not a breaking change the 'smalloc' module has been deprecated in anticipation of it becoming unsupportable with a future upgrade to V8 4.4. See #1451 for further information.
Note: a new version of the 'url' module was reverted prior to release as it was decided the potential for breakage across the npm ecosystem was too great and that more compatibility work needed to be done before releasing it. See #1602 for further information.
Known issues
See https://github.com/nodejs/node/labels/confirmed-bug for complete and current list of known issues.
- Some problems with unreferenced timers running during
beforeExit
are still to be resolved. See #1264. - Surrogate pair in REPL can freeze terminal #690
process.send()
is not synchronous as the docs suggest, a regression introduced in 1.0.2, see #760 and fix in #774- Calling
dns.setServers()
while a DNS query is in progress can cause the process to crash on a failed assertion #894 url.resolve
may transfer the auth portion of the url when resolving between two full hosts, see #1435.- readline: split escapes are processed incorrectly, see #1403
Community Updates
- Michael Dawson creates WG proposal under the Node Foundation.
- Mikeal Rogers wrote about growing up of io.js on Medium.
- CodeSchool blog post on what's new in io.js 2.0.
- Node Lead TJ Fontaine steps back from leader.
Upcoming Events
- NodeConf Adventure tickets are on sale, June 11th - 14th at Walker Creek Ranch, CA
- CascadiaJS tickets are on sale, July 8th - 10th at Washington State
- BrazilJS Conf tickets are on sale, August 21st - 22nd at Shopping Center BarraShoppingSul
- NodeConf EU tickets are on sale, September 6th - 9th at Waterford, Ireland