@amplitude/analytics-browser triggers the loading of @types/node which affects the signature of setTimeout

[stof]

Expected Behavior

Importing @amplitude/analytics-browser should not force the loading of types defined in @types/node

Current Behavior

@amplitude/analytics-browser imports @amplitude/analytics-types, which references the node types:

node_modules/@types/node/index.d.ts
  Type library referenced via 'node' from file 'node_modules/@amplitude/analytics-types/lib/response.d.ts' with packageId '@types/node/index.d.ts@18.7.6'

The beginning of node_modules/@amplitude/analytics-types/lib/response.d.ts looks like that:

/// <reference types="node" />
import { Status } from './status';

This reference to the node types is inserted by the compiler due to using NodeJS.ErrnoException in the type declaration of SystemErrorResponse. But this causes the loading of all of @types/node, which will then define the return type of setTimeout as being a Timeout object and not a number, which is very annoying when writing a project targetting the web.

Possible Solution

Types relying on Node types should be defined in @amplitude/analytics-node rather than @amplitude/analytics-types. Or a different definition of SystemErrorResponse should be provided.

Steps to Reproduce

1. yarn add --dev @amplitude/analytics-browser @types/node

2. Add this code in test.ts:

   import * as amplitude from '@amplitude/analytics-browser'
   
   const a: number = setTimeout(function () {})

3. Add this code in tsconfig.json:

   {
       "compilerOptions": {
           "noEmit": true,
           "esModuleInterop": true,
           "lib": ["dom"],
           "strict": true,
           "types": []
       },
       "files": [
           "test.ts"
       ]
   }
   

4. Run the typescript type checker on that code (tsc -p .)
5. See the error Type 'Timeout' is not assignable to type 'number'. reported on the a variable assignment
6. Comment the import of Amplitude and see the error disappear.

Environment

• JS SDK Version: @amplitude/analytics-browser 1.2.0
• Installation Method: yarn
• Browser and Version: n/a

[stof]

@kevinpagtakhan any idea about when this could be fixed ? It is quite annoying that importing @amplitude/analytics-browser breaks the type checking of unrelated code in our project.

[kevinpagtakhan]

Hey @stof! Thanks for choosing Amplitude. I opened a PR to remove the dependency on @types/node in our internal types package. I'll have some folks take a look at it and we'll get it out as soon as we can.

[stof]

Thanks