Here's a technique I often use to create entity data for automated tests:
Preparation
prime an EntityManager
with the entities (and entity graphs) that you want available at launch.
export as a string with var exported = manager.exportEntities();
. The exported
string has the metadata embedded in it so you won't have to bring that down separately. Two-for-one!
capture the contents of exported
to a JavaScript file that you load as script in index.html. My "capture" process is usually just to display in the console and scrape it.
Usage
Now when you need it:
load that JavaScript metadata+data file.
create a new EntityManager
(remember to target the same dataservice endpoint).
import the entities you captured in your script: manager.importEntities(launchData);
.
And you are good to go.
Read up on the EntityManager exportEntities
and importEntities
methods.
Example
One place you can see a variation on this technique is in the test directory of the "Zza-Node-Mongo".
I personally do not combine the data with the metadata so I export using the "no metadata" option. I put the metadata in one script and the data-to-load-on-launch (lookups usually) in a separate script and load both in index.html.
Caution
You say
to optimize the site, I included the breeze metadata in a bundled JavaScript that contains all the other JavaScript the site needs. Ideally, all I would like the browser to request is index.html, which should contain everything the app needs to run including bundled and minified inline styles and JavaScript.
Beware of premature optimization
I rather doubt that you will measurably improve the launch time of the app by embedding metadata and launch date in script files. Maybe some of the time if the browser caches these scripts. But that comes with its own risks and isn't a reliable strategy.
The data you want has to come over the wire to the client one way or another. It isn't self-evident that loading a script file - even a minimized script file - is any faster than pulling the metadata and launch data (both gzipped) down from the server via a web api AJAX call.
The techniques I described do speed up testing because I have to recreate metadata and the launch data before each test. I can measure the performance gain from avoiding repeated trips to the server. I gain nothing for the first trip ... which is the equivalent of your application launch.
Be mentally prepared to discover that your hard earned optimization efforts did not improve launch times ... and might even make them worse for some users.