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browserslist/caniuse-lite: A smaller version of caniuse-db, with only the essentials!

browserslist/caniuse-lite: A smaller version of caniuse-db, with only the essentials!

5 hours ago

caniuse-lite

A smaller version of caniuse-db, with only the essentials!

Why?

The full data behind [Can I use][1] is incredibly useful for any front end developer, and on the website all of the details from the database are displayed to the user. However in automated tools, [many of these fields go unused][2]; it's not a problem for server side consumption but client side, the less JavaScript that we send to the end user the better.

caniuse-lite then, is a smaller dataset that keeps essential parts of the data in a compact format. It does this in multiple ways, such as converting null array entries into empty strings, representing support data as an integer rather than a string, and using base62 references instead of longer human-readable keys.

This packed data is then reassembled (via functions exposed by this module) into a larger format which is mostly compatible with caniuse-db, and so it can be used as an almost drop-in replacement for caniuse-db for contexts where size on disk is important; for example, usage in web browsers. The API differences are very small and are detailed in the section below.

API

import * as lite from 'caniuse-lite'

lite.agents

caniuse-db provides a full data.json file which contains all of the features data. Instead of this large file, caniuse-lite provides this data subset instead, which has the browser, prefix, prefix_exceptions, usage_global and versions keys from the original.

In addition, the subset contains the release_date key with release dates (as timestamps) for each version:

{
  "release_date": {
    "6": 998870400,
    "7": 1161129600,
    "8": 1237420800,
    "9": 1300060800,
    "10": 1346716800,
    "11": 1381968000,
    "5.5": 962323200
  }
}

lite.feature(js)

The feature method takes a file from data/features and converts it into something that more closely represents the caniuse-db format. Note that only the title, stats, status, and shown keys are kept from the original data.

lite.features

The features index is provided as a way to query all of the features that are listed in the caniuse-db dataset. Note that you will need to use the feature method on values from this index to get a human-readable format.

lite.region(js)

The region method takes a file from data/regions and converts it into something that more closely represents the caniuse-db format. Note that _only_ the usage data is exposed here (the data key in the original files).

License

The data in this repo is available for use under a CC BY 4.0 license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). For attribution just mention somewhere that the source is caniuse.com. If you have any questions about using the data for your project please contact me here: http://a.deveria.com/contact

[1]: http://caniuse.com/ [2]: https://github.com/Fyrd/caniuse/issues/1827

Security contact information

To report a security vulnerability, please use the Tidelift security contact. Tidelift will coordinate the fix and disclosure.

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