[FR]: Allow using node headers for node-gyp from repo rule

[fa93hws]

What is the current behavior?

Background

At the moment, when running life cycle via node-gyp, it need to download node headers from https://nodejs.org/download/release/v20.12.2/node-v20.12.2-headers.tar.gz, which

1. Does not use bazel downloader
2. The url is external

Use local tarball

node-gyp does provide some args that allows us to override the node header in many ways, and I think the most appropriate one is tarball https://github.com/nodejs/node-gyp?tab=readme-ov-file#command-options. It's configurable via npm_config_tarball env which can be achieved in lifecycle_hooks_envs.
What's the alternative?

1. --dist-url. It solves the external url issue, but it's still better to use the bazel downloader I think
2. --devdir and --ensure: node-gyp will check a file called installVersion under devdir and it's coupled with node-gyp version

Blockers so far

In order to use npm_config_tarball, an intended workflow would be adding a repo rule, such as

    http_archive(
        name = "node_header",
        strip_prefix = "node-v20.12.2",
        urls = [
            "https://nodejs.org/download/release/v20.12.2/node-v20.12.2-headers.tar.gz",
        ],
    )

However, there's no way to pass the path to the lifecycle action at the moment if I get it correct?

Describe the feature

I'm happy to create a PR for that, but I'm not sure what's the best solution. From what I can see there are multiple ones

Pass tarball to npm_translate_lock directly

API:

It can be called something like lifecycle_hooks_gyp_tarball, e.g. lifecycle_hooks_gyp_tarball = "@node_header//tarball".

Implementation:

When generating the defs.bzl via template for packages that need node-gyp, like /external/aspect_rules_js~~npm~pnpm_deps__node-pty__1.0.0__links/defs.bzl, @node_header//tarball is added to its srcs, and a flag will also be passed to lifecycle-hooks, --tarball=xxx. lifecycle-hooks.js will then append it with process.cwd() and pass to node-gyp

pros

API is easy to use

cons

A bit too specific? Not sure whether we want to introduce such an option

Allow adding dependencies to lifecycle hook

API

Add a new option maybe called lifecycle_hooks_additional_deps, like

"lifecycle_hooks_additional_deps": {
  "node-pty": ["@node_header//tarball"]
}

Implementation

When generating the defs.bzl via template for packages that need node-gyp, like /external/aspect_rules_js~~npm~pnpm_deps__node-pty__1.0.0__links/defs.bzl, these additional deps are added to its srcs. However, since bazel doesn't allow finding the absolute path of the input, we still need to find a way to prepend cwd in lifecycle-hooks.js. I'm thinking maybe we can add a functionality in lifecycle-hooks.js, to replace $CWD with process.cwd()?

cons

A bit hard to consumes it, but I think it's fine? It's advance usage to use your own node header?

pros

It's much generous, people may want to pass other deps to lifecycle hooks?

Use @rules_nodejs//nodejs/headers:current_node_cc_headers

I'm blocked on the generated defs.bzl

    _js_run_binary(
        name = "{}/lc".format(store_target_name),
        srcs = [
            ...
            # node header tarball for node_gyp
            "@rules_nodejs//nodejs/headers:current_node_cc_headers", <--
        ],
        # js_run_binary runs in the output dir; must add "../../../" because paths are relative to the exec root
        args = [
                   ...
                   --header_dir=??? <-- how can I pass the dir to @rules_nodejs//nodejs/headers:current_node_cc_headers?
               ] +
               select({
                   Label("@aspect_rules_js//platforms/os:osx"): ["--platform=darwin"],
                   Label("@aspect_rules_js//platforms/os:linux"): ["--platform=linux"],
                   Label("@aspect_rules_js//platforms/os:windows"): ["--platform=win32"],
                   "//conditions:default": [],
               }) +
                ....
    )