gulp browserify reactify task is quite slow

Question

I am using Gulp as my task runner and browserify to bundle my CommonJs modules.

I have noticed that running my browserify task is quite slow, it takes around 2 - 3 seconds, and all I have is React and a few very small components I have built for development.

Is there a way to speed up the task, or do I have any noticeable problems in my task?

gulp.task('browserify', function() {
  var bundler = browserify({
    entries: ['./main.js'], // Only need initial file
    transform: [reactify], // Convert JSX to javascript
    debug: true, cache: {}, packageCache: {}, fullPaths: true
  });

  var watcher  = watchify(bundler);

  return watcher
  .on('update', function () { // On update When any files updates
    var updateStart = Date.now();
        watcher.bundle()
        .pipe(source('bundle.js'))
        .pipe(gulp.dest('./'));
        console.log('Updated ', (Date.now() - updateStart) + 'ms');
  })
  .bundle() // Create initial bundle when starting the task 
  .pipe(source('bundle.js'))
  .pipe(gulp.dest('./'));
});

I am using Browserify, Watchify, Reactify and Vinyl Source Stream as well as a few other unrelated modules.

var browserify = require('browserify'),
watchify = require('watchify'),
reactify = require('reactify'),
source = require('vinyl-source-stream');

Thanks

Answer 1

See fast browserify builds with watchify. Note that the only thing passed to browserify is the main entry point, and watchify's config.

The transforms are added to the watchify wrapper.

_{code from article pasted verbatim}

var gulp = require('gulp');
var gutil = require('gulp-util');
var sourcemaps = require('gulp-sourcemaps');
var source = require('vinyl-source-stream');
var buffer = require('vinyl-buffer');
var watchify = require('watchify');
var browserify = require('browserify');

var bundler = watchify(browserify('./src/index.js', watchify.args));
// add any other browserify options or transforms here
bundler.transform('brfs');

gulp.task('js', bundle); // so you can run `gulp js` to build the file
bundler.on('update', bundle); // on any dep update, runs the bundler

function bundle() {
  return bundler.bundle()
    // log errors if they happen
    .on('error', gutil.log.bind(gutil, 'Browserify Error'))
    .pipe(source('bundle.js'))
    // optional, remove if you dont want sourcemaps
      .pipe(buffer())
      .pipe(sourcemaps.init({loadMaps: true})) // loads map from browserify file
      .pipe(sourcemaps.write('./')) // writes .map file
    //
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./dist'));
}