I'm dealing with the same problem building a library and here is a rought opinion. I think we need to separate first the audiences for a library in few categories:
- those who use browserify and NPM
- those who will just download a mylib.min.js and use one way or another
- AMD (with bower?), might be the third category.
So, for 1 it is easy, you will have a your index.js module:
module.exports = function () { /* code */ }
and your package.json will have a main
"main": "index.js"
Notice I haven't add any window.xx code to index.js.
For 2 I think the best idea is to create a standalone.js
var mylib = require('./index.js');
global.window.mylib = mylib;
This is what browserify should build.
For 3 (if you care about) you can tweak standalone.js as follows:
var mylib = require('./index.js');
if (typeof global.window.define == 'function' && global.window.define.amd) {
global.window.define('mylib', function () { return mylib; });
} else {
global.window.mylib = mylib;
}