src()

Creates a stream for reading Vinyl objects from the file system.

Note: BOMs (byte order marks) have no purpose in UTF-8 and will be removed from UTF-8 files read by src(), unless disabled using the removeBOM option.

Usage

const { src, dest } = require('gulp');

function copy() {
  return src('input/*.js')
    .pipe(dest('output/'));
}

exports.copy = copy;

Signature

src(globs, [options])

Parameters

parameter	type	note
globs	string array	Globs to watch on the file system.
options	object	Detailed in Options below.

Returns

A stream that can be used at the beginning or in the middle of a pipeline to add files based on the given globs.

Errors

When the globs argument can only match one file (such as foo/bar.js) and no match is found, throws an error with the message, "File not found with singular glob". To suppress this error, set the allowEmpty option to true.

When an invalid glob is given in globs, throws an error with the message, "Invalid glob argument".

Options

For options that accept a function, the passed function will be called with each Vinyl object and must return a value of another listed type.

name	type	default	note
encoding	string boolean	"utf8"	When false, file contents are treated as binary. When a string, this is used as the text encoding.
buffer	boolean function	true	When true, file contents are buffered into memory. If false, the Vinyl object's contents property will be a paused stream. It may not be possible to buffer the contents of large files. Note: Plugins may not implement support for streaming contents.
read	boolean function	true	If false, files will be not be read and their Vinyl objects won't be writable to disk via .dest().
since	date timestamp function		When set, only creates Vinyl objects for files modified since the specified time.
removeBOM	boolean function	true	When true, removes the BOM from UTF-8 encoded files. If false, ignores a BOM.
sourcemaps	boolean function	false	If true, enables sourcemaps support on Vinyl objects created. Loads inline sourcemaps and resolves external sourcemap links.
resolveSymlinks	boolean function	true	When true, recursively resolves symbolic links to their targets. If false, preserves the symbolic links and sets the Vinyl object's symlink property to the original file's path.
cwd	string	process.cwd()	The directory that will be combined with any relative path to form an absolute path. Is ignored for absolute paths. Use to avoid combining globs with path.join(). This option is passed directly to glob-stream.
base	string		Explicitly set the base property on created Vinyl objects. Detailed in API Concepts. This option is passed directly to glob-stream.
cwdbase	boolean	false	If true, cwd and base options should be aligned. This option is passed directly to glob-stream.
root	string		The root path that globs are resolved against. This option is passed directly to glob-stream.
allowEmpty	boolean	false	When false, globs which can only match one file (such as foo/bar.js) causes an error to be thrown if they don't find a match. If true, suppresses glob failures. This option is passed directly to glob-stream.
uniqueBy	string function	'path'	Remove duplicates from the stream by comparing the string property name or the result of the function. Note: When using a function, the function receives the streamed data (objects containing cwd, base, path properties).
dot	boolean	false	If true, compare globs against dot files, like .gitignore. This option is passed directly to anymatch.
nounique	boolean	false	When false, prevents duplicate files in the result set. This option is passed directly to anymatch.
debug	boolean	false	If true, debugging information will be logged to the command line. This option is passed directly to anymatch.
nobrace	boolean	false	If true, avoids expanding brace sets - e.g. {a,b} or {1..3}. This option is passed directly to anymatch.
noglobstar	boolean	false	If true, treats double-star glob character as single-star glob character. This option is passed directly to anymatch.
noext	boolean	false	If true, avoids matching extglob patterns - e.g. +(ab). This option is passed directly to anymatch.
nocase	boolean	false	If true, performs a case-insensitive match. Note: On case-insensitive file systems, non-magic patterns will match by default. This option is passed directly to anymatch.
matchBase	boolean	false	If true and globs don't contain any / characters, traverses all directories and matches that glob - e.g. *.js would be treated as equivalent to **/*.js. This option is passed directly to anymatch.
ignore	string array		Globs to exclude from matches. This option is combined with negated globs. Note: These globs are always matched against dot files, regardless of any other settings. This option is passed directly to anymatch.

Sourcemaps

Sourcemap support is built directly into src() and dest(), but is disabled by default. Enable it to produce inline or external sourcemaps.

Inline sourcemaps:

const { src, dest } = require('gulp');
const uglify = require('gulp-uglify');

src('input/**/*.js', { sourcemaps: true })
  .pipe(uglify())
  .pipe(dest('output/', { sourcemaps: true }));

External sourcemaps:

const { src, dest } = require('gulp');
const uglify = require('gulp-uglify');

src('input/**/*.js', { sourcemaps: true })
  .pipe(uglify())
  .pipe(dest('output/', { sourcemaps: '.' }));