Setting up the runner

Laravel users can skip the following section as the Laravel package already has built-in support for watching changes.

In the beginning of this documentation we saw how to create a command using a runner to transform TypeScript types. In order to enable watching changes we'll need to set up the runner a bit differently:

use Symfony\Component\Console\Command\Command;
use Symfony\Component\Console\Input\InputInterface;
use Symfony\Component\Console\Input\InputOption;
use Symfony\Component\Console\Output\OutputInterface;

class GenerateTypeScriptCommand extends Command
{
    protected static $defaultName = 'typescript:transform';

    protected function configure(): void
    {
        $this
            ->setDescription('Transform TypeScript types')
            ->addOption('watch', 'w', InputOption::VALUE_NONE, 'Watch for file changes')
            ->addOption('worker', null, InputOption::VALUE_NONE, 'Run as worker process');
    }

    protected function execute(InputInterface $input, OutputInterface $output): int
    {
        $runner = new Runner();

        $config = TypeScriptTransformerConfigFactory::create()->get();

        return $runner->run(
            logger: new SymfonyConsoleLogger($output),
            config: $config,
            mode: match ([$input->getOption('watch'), $input->getOption('worker')]) {
                [false, false] => RunnerMode::Direct,
                [true, false] => RunnerMode::Master,
                [true, true] => RunnerMode::Worker,
                default => throw new \Exception('A worker only needs to be started in watch mode.'),
            },
            workerCommand: fn (bool $watch) => 'bin/console typescript:transform --worker '.($watch ? '--watch ' : ''),
        );
    }
}

The command above adds two options: --watch and --worker. The --watch option is used to start the master process which watches for file changes, the --worker option is used internally by the master process to start the worker process.

Feel free to adjust the workerCommand closure to your own command structure so that the master process can start the worker correctly.

##Refactoring with an IDE or AI Agent

When running multiple changes throughout your codebase in multiple files at once like refactoring a class name in PHPStorm or letting Claude code make multiple changes, the watcher might not be able to pick up these changes up to ten seconds after they were made. This is due to the fact that most IDEs and AI Agents make changes in a temporary file and then move the temporary file to the original file location.

In the end TypeScript transformer will pick up these changes, but it might take a bit longer than expected.