====Building an ARDI-Powered Electron App====

We've provided a basic template for creating ARDI-powered Electron apps.

You are not required to use this template - you can create anything you want with ARDI data - but it can help you get started quickly.

//NOTE - This template is extremely bare-bones and is designed to help people build simple, pure-Javascript applications that focus on data visualisation. Our template isn't designed with React, Vue or other frameworks in mind.//

===Step 1: Requirements===

Install [[https://nodejs.org/en|Node.JS]] onto your development system, along with **npm** - the Node Package Manager.

===Step 2: Create an Electron App===

Open a terminal/command prompt and go to the folder you'd like to create your project in.

Type the following, where 'my-app' will be name and folder of the app you want to create.

<code>
npx create-electron-app@latest my-app
</code>

This will take a few moments to install of the required files.

===Step 3: Copy Our Template===

Next, you can extract the content of our [[https://ardi.com.au/downloads/misc/electron-src.zip|Electron Template]] into your 'src' folder.

===Step 4: Housekeeping===

Open the **package.json** file that was created for you and change the value of //main// to 'src/main.js' instead of 'src/index.js'.

===Step 5: Run the Program===

You can now test things out by going into to your project folder in your terminal/command prompt session and typing...

<code>
npm start
</code>

===Making It Your Own===

Next, you'll want to know [[editing|how to customise the app]] you've made.