Minified JS find and replace a valid strategy for substitution?

Question

For reasons not important to the question (using the output of create-react-app, would like to parameterize some variables POST build time i.e as they're deployed), I am in a scenario where I would like to replace all instances of a string i.e "REPLACE_ME" with a value.

This would be trivial if I had access to the un-minified javascript; however, I am wondering if a find and replace on the minified javascript will suffice?

Answer 1

create-react-app is using Webpack under the hood, You can use webpack.DefinePlugin to achieve that in a build time.

// webpack.config.js
const webpack = require('webpack');

const config = {
  entry: './src/index.js',
  output: {
    ...
  },
  plugins: [
    new webpack.DefinePlugin({
      REPLACE_ME: JSON.stringify('yourBuildTimeValueGoesHere'),
    }),
    ...
  ],
  ...
}

module.exports = config;