Half-baked solution to Open in Editor in Node.js like git commit does (Forsaken in favor of Inquirer Prompt type 'Editor')

half_baked_nodejs_open_in_editor.js

import { spawnSync } from 'child_process'
import { readFileSync } from 'fs'
import { temporaryWriteSync } from 'tempy'

// Get the default editor
const editor = process.env['VISUAL'] || process.env['EDITOR'] || 'vi'

console.log(`Opening in EDITOR: ${editor}. Save and quit the editor process to continue.`)

// If within another interactive program, uncomment this to prevent wacky visuals
// console.clear()

// Create a temp file
const preloadedFileContents = 'hello world'
const tempFileName = temporaryWriteSync(preloadedFileContents)

// Open the Editor Process - Wait until process exits.
spawnSync(editor, [tempFileName], {stdio: 'inherit'});

// Once process has exited, read the file contents
const fileContents = readFileSync(tempFileName, { encoding: 'utf-8' }).trim()

// Cleanup if necessary, depending on what you're doing
const lines = fileContents.split('\n')
  .map(it => it.trim())
  .filter(it => !/^\s*$/.test(it))

References

• CLI: implement something like git commit (open a text editor and get value)
• https://the-guild.dev/blog/nodes-child-process
• Inquirer.js - Prompt which has an editor prompt type