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Quick Start

Command Line Usage​

The gtfs-to-html command-line utility will download the GTFS file specified in config.js and then build the HTML timetables and save them in html/:agencyKey.

If you would like to use this library as a command-line utility, you can install it globally directly from npm:

npm install gtfs-to-html -g

Then you can run gtfs-to-html.

gtfs-to-html

Command-line options​

configPath

Allows specifying a path to a configuration json file. By default, gtfs-to-html will look for a config.json file in the directory it is being run from. See all configuration options

gtfs-to-html --configPath /path/to/your/custom-config.json

skipImport

Skips importing GTFS into SQLite. Useful if you are rerunning with an unchanged GTFS file. If you use this option and the GTFS file hasn't been imported, you'll get an error.

gtfs-to-html --skipImport

Customizing the output​

You can create your own template to completely customize the HTML output using custom templates.

Processing very large GTFS files.​

By default, node has a memory limit of 512 MB or 1 GB. If you have a very large GTFS file and want to use the option showOnlyTimepoint = false you may need to allocate more memory. Use the max-old-space-size option. For example to allocate 4 GB:

NODE_OPTIONS=--max_old_space_size=4096 gtfs-to-html

Docker Usage​

You can use both docker and docker-compose to run GTFS-to-HTML.

Dockerfile​

A Dockerfile is available in the docker directory.

  • Create a config.json file and save in the same directory as your Dockerfile. You can use config-sample.json from the project root as a starting point. For Docker usage, remove any sqlitePath and templatePath values from the config.json.

  • Build the docker image:

docker build -t gtfs-to-html .
  • Run the docker image:
docker run gtfs-to-html
  • Copy the generated HTML out of the docker container
// Figure out what your container ID is
docker container ls -a

// Then copy the html folder from that container
docker cp <YOUR IMAGE CONTAINER ID>:/html .

// For example:
docker cp ca45a38963d9:/html .

Docker Compose​

Docker compose is used for multi-container Docker applications. In this context, it is just a convenient way to manage volumes. This allows (i) to get the generated HTML out of the docker container without explicitly copying with docker cp, and (ii) to tweak and run a new configuration without rebuilding the container from scratch.

  • Create a config.json file and save in the same directory as your Dockerfile and docker-compose.yml;

  • build and run the container:

docker-compose up
  • the generated HTML will be available in the folder html next to docker files.

Do you want to change something? Just delete the old HTML, change your config.json, and finally run docker-compose up again.

Usage as a node module​

If you are using this as a node module as part of an application, you can include it in your project's package.json file.

Code example​

import gtfsToHtml from 'gtfs-to-html';
import { readFile } from 'fs/promises';
const config = JSON.parse(
  await readFile(new URL('./config.json', import.meta.url))
);

gtfsToHtml(config)
  .then(() => {
    console.log('HTML Generation Successful');
    process.exit();
  })
  .catch((err) => {
    console.error(err);
    process.exit(1);
  });

Example Application​

An example Express application that uses gtfs-to-html is included in the dist/app folder. After an initial run of gtfs-to-html, the GTFS data will be downloaded and loaded into SQLite.

You can view an individual route HTML on demand by running the included Express app:

node ./dist/app

By default, gtfs-to-html will look for a config.json file in the project root. To specify a different path for the configuration file:

node ./dist/app --configPath /path/to/your/custom-config.json

Once running, you can view the HTML in your browser at localhost:3000

Usage as a hosted web app​

A hosted version of GTFS-to-HTML as a service allows you to use it entirely within your browser - no downloads or command line necessary. Currently, it is limited to relatively small GTFS files and doesn't offer support for Custom Templates.

It provides:

  • a web-based interface for finding GTFS feeds or ability to enter your own URL
  • support for adding custom configuration as JSON
  • creation of HTML or PDF timetables as a downloadable .zip file
  • a preview of all timetables generated directly in your browser

run.gtfstohtml.com