CODEWITHSUNDEEP
meteorphantomjs
Alex_Faber
Alex_Faber

Reputation: 117

Installing/Using Phantom.js with Meteor

I'm currently struggling with using Phantom.js with a Meteor app of mine. I have it installed on my local machine (Ubuntu 14.04), it's added to my path (I can run it from my terminal), I also ran and installed the smart wrapper for Phantomjs: mrt add phantomjs.

I can see that in my .meteor > local > build > programs > server > npm directory there is a phantomjs directory.

My question is, how do I actually use Phantom? I'm attempting to scrape from the server side of things. I've tried the following things (using coffeescript): phantom = Npm.require "phantomjs" phantom = Npm.require "phantom" phantom = Meteor.require "phantomjs" phantom = Meteor.require "phantom"

(I've also tried using capital "P's")

All attempts in this way yield: Error: Cannot find module 'phantomjs'

Any clarification would be greatly appreciated!

Upvotes: 1

Views: 3409

Answers (2)

Flavien Volken
Flavien Volken

Reputation: 21299

[EDIT] now meteor is supporting npm packages out of the box: https://guide.meteor.com/using-npm-packages.html#installing-npm

Here is the procedure for Meteor > 1.0.0

Add the npm package

meteor add meteorhacks:npm

Run meteor to let the npm package to pre-initialise

meteor

A file packages.json has been created at the root. Edit it to:

{
  "phantomjs": "1.9.13"
}

To use phantom into your server side code:

var phantomJS = Meteor.npmRequire("phantomjs");

Bonus: an example of usage (thanks Ben Green), put anywhere in your code:

if (Meteor.isServer) {
    Meteor.startup(function () {
        var phantomjs = Meteor.npmRequire('phantomjs');

        var spawn = Meteor.npmRequire('child_process').spawn;
        Meteor.methods({
            runTest: function (options) {
                command = spawn(phantomjs.path, ['assets/app/phantomDriver.js']);
                command.stdout.on('data', function (data) {
                    console.log('stdout: ' + data);
                });
                command.stderr.on('data', function (data) {
                    console.log('stderr: ' + data);
                });
                command.on('exit', function (code) {
                    console.log('child process exited with code ' + code);
                });
            }
        });

        Meteor.call("runTest");// run the test as soon as meteor server starts
    });
}

Create the phantomjs script file ./private/phantomDriver.js and edit it to

var page = require('webpage').create();
page.open('http://github.com/', function (){
    console.log('Page Loaded');
    page.render('github.png');
    phantom.exit();
});

Upvotes: 4

Marco de Jongh
Marco de Jongh

Reputation: 5448

The phantomjs wrapper in atmosphere doesn't look like it produces anything that works.

But you can easily add npm packages useing the npm meteorite package

First add the npm package to your project 

mrt add npm

Then add the required phantomjs version to the packages.json file

{
     "phantomjs": "1.9.7-6"
}

Then use the following code to require the phantomjs npm module:

var phantomjs = Meteor.require('phantomjs');

Upvotes: 3

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