Reduce native files size

[dougg0k]

Hi,

I was testing out ferric-cli, just with the ferric-example it seems to generate a big .so file just for android. In this case it were 6.1mb.

I suppose this can negatively affect the final build size of RN apps.

Is there a way or if possible, could you add rust flags to the CLI, or whatever that it can be done to help reduce size of the native generated file(s), .so or otherwise?

https://github.com/johnthagen/min-sized-rust

Thanks.

[kraenhansen]

I'd be happy to add anything to reduce the file size - got any concrete ideas in mind?

Notice that the current default --configuration is "Debug" and you'll likely get a smaller binary if you pass --configuration Release to ferric.

I know that there are also possibilities of shaving off size with link-time optimization (LTO) when building the final app.

[dougg0k]

I suggested the repo which already should contain all the possible ways. Whichever you choose and works.

Maybe leave Release as default?

[dougg0k]

> ferric build --configuration release

╭─────────────────────────╮
│░█▀▀░█▀▀░█▀▄░█▀▄░▀█▀░█▀▀░│
│░█▀▀░█▀▀░█▀▄░█▀▄░░█░░█░░░│
│░▀░░░▀▀▀░▀░▀░▀░▀░▀▀▀░▀▀▀░│
╰─────────────────────────╯
ℹ Using default targets, pass --android, --apple or individual --target options, to avoid this.
Using cargo 1.88.0 (873a06493 2025-05-10)
✖ Failed to build: Expected /react-native-node-api/packages/ferric-example/target/x86_64-linux-android/release to exist

Could be that the bug is that you are passing release and not --release to cargo build, so it's only generating the debug folder.

❯ ll target/x86_64-linux-android/                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   
Octal Permissions Links Size User    Group   Date Modified Git Name
0755  drwxr-xr-x      1    - user user 24 jul 12:40   -I  debug/
0644  .rw-r--r--      1  177 user user 24 jul 12:40   -I  CACHEDIR.TAG

It seems encapsulated, perhaps if you had a flag to show all the actual commands being run in the background, through logging.

Also add a .toLowerCase() because, Release do not work.

[shirakaba]

Various common tricks for reducing binary size include these Cargo build settings:

[profile.release]
lto = true
strip = "symbols"
opt-level = "z"
codegen-units = 1
panic = "abort"

With those settings, I was able to get a Hello World Node-API module down to 304 KB for iOS or macOS (can't remember). Can't be sure what size that might mean for Android, however.

[dougg0k]

I checked, for android, it was reduced to ~330kb.

---

In packages/ferric-example

• Run npm run build
• Run cargo build --release
• Run mv target/release target/x86_64-linux-android/
• Run npm run build if the script has --configuration release

[dougg0k]

Maybe ferric-example should not exist. But be generated by the ferric-cli, that way Cargo.toml and other files could be better managed.

---

Then suggest

npm install --save-dev ferric-cli

"scripts": {
   "generate:project": "ferric generate folder_name",
   "build": "ferric build folder_name",
   "build:release": "npm run build --configuration release",
},

#195

[dougg0k]

If I am able to finish this PR, there should be plenty of improvements added.

#200 - List inside.

[dougg0k]

In the init/generate command, do you prefer that it provide a package.json to be a standalone lib or can it be as the idea I had, you suggest the scripts as in the previous comment, then that package import the lib from the dist/ in the actual project?

#206

[shirakaba]

In the init/generate command, do you prefer that it provide a package.json to be a standalone lib or can it be as the idea I had, you suggest the scripts as in the previous comment, then that package import the lib from the dist/ in the actual project?

Sorry, not quite clear what you mean. Could you illustrate the two alternatives?

[dougg0k]

1- Not a standalone package, without a package.json. But, managed by the package.json root of the app. Where the root package as suggested #196 (comment) managed as if it were an additional like android or ios.

project_name
│   Cargo.toml
│   build.rs
│   .gitignore
└───src
│   │   lib.rs
└───dist (after build)
│   │   index.js
│   │   index.d.ts
│   │   native_android_folder
│   │   native_ios_folder

2- With a package.json to be a standalone lib.

[dougg0k]

I took the with second approach. Let me know if you preferred the first.

I think I am done with the PRs, feel free to review them.

I will probably wait for them to maybe get merged and released before using the tool.

---

I will close this issue as done. Added through one of the PRs.