Uncaught (in promise) TypeError: spawn is not a function

Question

I am bit stuck here. I am submitting an async request with redux-thunk in my action creator which looks like this:

export const downloadFromYoutube = (download) => {
  console.log("Hello");
    return dispatch => {
      var YoutubeMp3Downloader = require('youtube-mp3-downloader');

      var YD = new YoutubeMp3Downloader({
          "ffmpegPath": "/usr/local/Cellar/ffmpeg/3.2.2/bin/ffmpeg",        // Where is the FFmpeg binary located?
          "outputPath": "/Users/dominik/Coding/youtube-downloader-papa/downloads",    // Where should the downloaded and encoded files be stored?
          "youtubeVideoQuality": "highest",       // What video quality should be used?
          "queueParallelism": 2,                  // How many parallel downloads/encodes should be started?
          "progressTimeout": 2000                 // How long should be the interval of the progress reports
      });

      console.log("Hello");
      YD.on("finished", data => dispatch({ type: "FINISHED", payload: data }));
      YD.on("error", error => dispatch({ type: "ERROR", payload: error }));
      YD.on("progress", progress => dispatch({ type: "PROGRESS", payload: progress }));

      // dispatch a "starting" action
      // dispatch({ type: "STARTING" });

      // start the download
      YD.download("UDzGLMLhy80");
     }
  };

But I am always getting the following error:

TypeError: spawn is not a function

I am using React/Redux in electron. I also should mention redux-thunk does work when I use a timeout function instead of the download function. However, the code above & use of the youtube downloader library also works fine when I just put it in a plain javascript / nodejs file and execute it, so it seems to have something to do with the way I handle promises in React.

Here is the full error log:

Uncaught (in promise) TypeError: spawn is not a function(…)(anonymous function) @ processor.js:135proto._getFfmpegPath @ capabilities.js:90proto._spawnFfmpeg @ processor.js:115proto.availableFormats.proto.getAvailableFormats @ capabilities.js:514(anonymous function) @ capabilities.js:564fn @ async.js:746(anonymous function) @ async.js:1213(anonymous function) @ async.js:166(anonymous function) @ async.js:706(anonymous function) @ async.js:167async.waterfall @ async.js:710proto._checkCapabilities @ capabilities.js:561(anonymous function) @ processor.js:287fn @ async.js:746(anonymous function) @ async.js:1213(anonymous function) @ async.js:166(anonymous function) @ async.js:706(anonymous function) @ async.js:167async.waterfall @ async.js:710proto._prepare @ processor.js:284proto.exec.proto.execute.proto.run @ processor.js:420proto.saveToFile.proto.save @ recipes.js:28(anonymous function) @ YoutubeMp3Downloader.js:151emitOne @ events.js:77emit @ events.js:169(anonymous function) @ index.js:113emitOne @ events.js:77emit @ events.js:169ClientRequest._connect @ request.js:235(anonymous function) @ request.js:128

Answer 1

Spawn is a construct of nodejs. React as a framework does not have the method. This library is to be used in server side (nodejs). You can expose a http api which can be triggered via react. The http api can then trigger the library in nodejs server.