Webpack file-loader not loading files with complex paths

Question

I've got a project that uses Typescript 2.4.1, Webpack 2.6.1, and I'm having some issues getting relative paths to load my images correctly.

If I put an image in the same folder as my .ts file that loads it, I can get it to work:

const background = require("./background.png");
console.log(background);

So this works:

src
   Book.ts
   background.png

But I can't figure out how to make file loader find the image with this structure:

src
   Book.ts
assets
   background.png

I tried setting the publicPath in the file-loader options as described here but I couldn't get the file to load at all that way no matter what combinations of absolute and relative paths I tried.

Here's my webpack.config.js file. (I removed some parts because it is long.)

module.exports = {
    entry: {
        app: [
            path.resolve(__dirname, './src/main.ts')
        ],
        vendor: ['pixi', 'p2', 'phaser', 'webfontloader']
    },
    output: {
        pathinfo: true,
        path: path.resolve(__dirname, 'dist'),
        publicPath: './dist/',
        filename: 'bundle.js'
    },
    module: {
        rules: [
            {test: /\.ts$/, enforce: 'pre', loader: 'tslint-loader', options: {emitErrors: true, failOnHint: true}},
            {test: /\.ts$/, loader: 'ts-loader'},
            {test: /pixi\.js/, use: ['expose-loader?PIXI']},
            {test: /phaser-split\.js$/, use: ['expose-loader?Phaser']},
            {test: /p2\.js/, use: ['expose-loader?p2']},
            {test: /\.(png|svg|jpg|gif|mp3|wav|mp4)$/, use: [{
                loader: 'file-loader',
                options: {
                    outputPath: 'assets/'
                }
            }]},
            {enforce: "pre", test: /\.js$/, loader: "source-map-loader"}
        ]
    },
    node: {
        fs: 'empty',
        net: 'empty',
        tls: 'empty'
    }
}

And here's my typescript require declaration:

declare let require: {
    <T>(path: string): T;
    (paths: string[], callback: (...modules: any[]) => void): void;
    ensure: (paths: string[], callback: (require: <T>(path: string) => T) => void) => void;
};

(I tried getting nice ES6 imports working, but that didn't go well.)

Answer 1

I tried it with file-loader and it didnt really work...

try using "url-loader" like this in webpack.config:

  // "url" loader works like "file" loader except that it embeds assets
  // smaller than specified limit in bytes as data URLs to avoid requests.
  // A missing `test` is equivalent to a match.
  {
    test: [/\.bmp$/, /\.gif$/, /\.jpe?g$/, /\.png$/],
    loader: require.resolve('url-loader'),
    options: {
      limit: 10000,
      name: 'static/media/[name].[hash:8].[ext]',
    },
  },

Then you can "just" use this to get the path which you can then use:

const imageSrc = import('./relativePathToImgFile');

Edit: And dont forget to add url-loader to package.json :)