Development tools

C8Y Command Line Tool (CLI)

To support you with bootstrapping, running and deploying applications we have build a Command Line Interface. The tool is the successor of the cumulocity-node-tools. To avoid conflicts, it listens to the new command c8ycli instead of c8y. You can install it via npm:

npm install -g @c8y/cli

Usage 

c8ycli [options] [command]
Info
The commands must be executed from the root path of the project.

Options 

    -u, --url <url>                 The URL of the remote instance
    --version                       Provides version number
    -h, --help                      Provides usage information

Commands

All the commands except of new take an array of glob patterns. These will be solved to folders or entry point manifests.

    new [name] [template]                   Creates a folder to start a new application or extend an existing one
    serve [options] [appPaths...]           Runs local development server
    build [options] [appPaths...]           Builds the specified applications
    deploy [options] [appPaths...]          Deploys applications from the specified paths
    locale-extract [options] [srcPaths...]  Extracts all strings for translation and outputs the .po files to defined folder

The new command

The c8ycli new [name] [template] helps to start an empty application or to extend one of our existing applications (Cockpit, Devicemanagement or Administration). To extend an existing application use as [name] and [template] the name of the existing application like this:

$ c8ycli new cockpit cockpit
Tip

The c8ycli new command has a -a flag which defines which package to use for scaffolding. This way you can also define which version of the app you want to scaffold, for example:

  • c8ycli new my-cockpit cockpit -a @c8y/apps@1004.11.0 will scaffold an app with the version 10.4.11.0
  • c8ycli new my-cockpit cockpit -a @c8y/apps@latest will scaffold an app with the latest official release. Same as if used without the -a flag
  • c8ycli new my-cockpit cockpit -a @c8y/apps@next will scaffold an app with the latest beta release.

The c8ycli new command can also be provided on its own without the [name] and [template] options. In this case a few steps must be completed via the interface before the app is scaffolded.

Step 1:

? Enter the name of the project: (my-application)

The first step asks for the project name. If no project name is entered, the default value my-application is used.

Info
This step can also be skipped if the name is provided in the initial command: c8ycli new my-application.

Step 2:

? Which base version do you want to scaffold from? (Use arrow keys)
> 1010.0.X (latest)
> 1011.X.0 (next)
> 1011.0.X
> 1009.0.X
> 1007.0.X
> 1006.0.X
> other

In the second step, the base scaffolding version must be selected. The interface will provide the last GA release (latest), the latest available release (next) and four older GA releases. Additionally a version can be manually entered by selecting the other option.

Step 2 (other):

? Enter the desired version:

In this step, the desired version must be entered manually, for example, 1010.0.0.

Info
This question will appear only if other was selected in the previous step.

Step 3:

? Which base project do you want to scaffold from?
  administration
  application
  cockpit
  devicemanagement
  hybrid
  tutorial

In the final step, the base project to scaffold from must be selected.

Info
This step will only show projects which are available for the selected version in Step 2.

Application options

Application options can be defined with --app.<option>=<value>. These will be applied to all applications found with [appPaths...].

    --app.name="My Application"
    --app.key=myapp-key
    --app.contextPath=myapplication
    --app.brandingEntry="./branding/mybranding.less"

Webpack options

Webpack options can be defined with --env.<option>=<value>. These will be directly passed to the webpack configuration.

    --env.mode="production"
    --env.hmr

Angular Command Line Tool (CLI)

When developing a pure Angular you can create an Angular CLI (ng-cli) project and add Cumulocity IoT CLI to it. This functionality is available for Angular 7 from version 10.4.2.0, for Angular 8 from version 10.5.9.0 and for Angular 11 from version 10.10.4.0.

Install Angular CLI

Follow the instructions to install @c8y/cli globally.

npm install -g @angular/cli@v8-lts

Create a new project 

ng new my-first-iot-project
cd my-first-iot-project

Add Cumulocity IoT CLI 

ng add @c8y/cli

Run application 

ng serve

In your browser, open http://localhost:4200/ to see the new application run.

You can configure the application options inside the package.json file and customize branding with LESS or CSS custom variables.