createElement

Vue通过createElement方法创建VNode，该方法定义在src/core/vdom/create-element.js

export function createElement (
  context: Component,
  tag: any,
  data: any,
  children: any,
  normalizationType: any,
  alwaysNormalize: boolean
): VNode | Array<VNode> {
  if (Array.isArray(data) || isPrimitive(data)) {
    normalizationType = children
    children = data
    data = undefined
  }
  if (isTrue(alwaysNormalize)) {
    normalizationType = ALWAYS_NORMALIZE
  }
  return _createElement(context, tag, data, children, normalizationType)
}

createElement方法在对参数处理后，实际调用了_createElement方法创建VNode，代码如下：

export function _createElement (
  context: Component,
  tag?: string | Class<Component> | Function | Object,
  data?: VNodeData,
  children?: any,
  normalizationType?: number
): VNode | Array<VNode> {
  if (isDef(data) && isDef((data: any).__ob__)) {
    process.env.NODE_ENV !== 'production' && warn(
      `Avoid using observed data object as vnode data: ${JSON.stringify(data)}\n` +
      'Always create fresh vnode data objects in each render!',
      context
    )
    return createEmptyVNode()
  }
  // object syntax in v-bind
  if (isDef(data) && isDef(data.is)) {
    tag = data.is
  }
  if (!tag) {
    // in case of component :is set to falsy value
    return createEmptyVNode()
  }
  // warn against non-primitive key
  if (process.env.NODE_ENV !== 'production' &&
    isDef(data) && isDef(data.key) && !isPrimitive(data.key)
  ) {
    if (!__WEEX__ || !('@binding' in data.key)) {
      warn(
        'Avoid using non-primitive value as key, ' +
        'use string/number value instead.',
        context
      )
    }
  }
  // support single function children as default scoped slot
  if (Array.isArray(children) &&
    typeof children[0] === 'function'
  ) {
    data = data || {}
    data.scopedSlots = { default: children[0] }
    children.length = 0
  }
  if (normalizationType === ALWAYS_NORMALIZE) {
    children = normalizeChildren(children)
  } else if (normalizationType === SIMPLE_NORMALIZE) {
    children = simpleNormalizeChildren(children)
  }
  let vnode, ns
  if (typeof tag === 'string') {
    let Ctor
    ns = (context.$vnode && context.$vnode.ns) || config.getTagNamespace(tag)
    if (config.isReservedTag(tag)) {
      // platform built-in elements
      if (process.env.NODE_ENV !== 'production' && isDef(data) && isDef(data.nativeOn) && data.tag !== 'component') {
        warn(
          `The .native modifier for v-on is only valid on components but it was used on <${tag}>.`,
          context
        )
      }
      vnode = new VNode(
        config.parsePlatformTagName(tag), data, children,
        undefined, undefined, context
      )
    } else if ((!data || !data.pre) && isDef(Ctor = resolveAsset(context.$options, 'components', tag))) {
      // component
      vnode = createComponent(Ctor, data, context, children, tag)
    } else {
      // unknown or unlisted namespaced elements
      // check at runtime because it may get assigned a namespace when its
      // parent normalizes children
      vnode = new VNode(，
        tag, data, children,
        undefined, undefined, context
      )
    }
  } else {
    // direct component options / constructor
    vnode = createComponent(tag, data, context, children)
  }
  if (Array.isArray(vnode)) {
    return vnode
  } else if (isDef(vnode)) {
    if (isDef(ns)) applyNS(vnode, ns)
    if (isDef(data)) registerDeepBindings(data)
    return vnode
  } else {
    return createEmptyVNode()
  }
}

该方法共有5个参数：

• context：表示上下文环境，类型是Component
• tag：标签，可以是string或Component类型
• data：VNodeData类型的数据
• children：VNode的子节点，可以是任意类型，接下来会被规范为标准的VNode数组
• normalizationType：子节点规范的类型，不同的类型调用的规范处理方法也不同

接下来我们主要分析children的规范化处理和VNode的创建

children规范化

根据normalizationType不同，分别调用了normalizeChildren(children)和children = simpleNormalizeChildren(children)对children进行规范化处理，这两个方法定义在src/core/vdom/helpers/normalize-children.js

// The template compiler attempts to minimize the need for normalization by
// statically analyzing the template at compile time.
//
// For plain HTML markup, normalization can be completely skipped because the
// generated render function is guaranteed to return Array<VNode>. There are
// two cases where extra normalization is needed:

// 1. When the children contains components - because a functional component
// may return an Array instead of a single root. In this case, just a simple
// normalization is needed - if any child is an Array, we flatten the whole
// thing with Array.prototype.concat. It is guaranteed to be only 1-level deep
// because functional components already normalize their own children.
export function simpleNormalizeChildren (children: any) {
  for (let i = 0; i < children.length; i++) {
    if (Array.isArray(children[i])) {
      return Array.prototype.concat.apply([], children)
    }
  }
  return children
}

// 2. When the children contains constructs that always generated nested Arrays,
// e.g. <template>, <slot>, v-for, or when the children is provided by user
// with hand-written render functions / JSX. In such cases a full normalization
// is needed to cater to all possible types of children values.
export function normalizeChildren (children: any): ?Array<VNode> {
  return isPrimitive(children)
    ? [createTextVNode(children)]
    : Array.isArray(children)
      ? normalizeArrayChildren(children)
      : undefined
}

simpleNormalizeChildren方法的调用场景是render函数生成的，理论上编译生成的 children 都已经是 VNode 类型的，但这里有一个例外，就是 functional component 函数式组件返回的是一个数组而不是一个根节点，所以会通过 Array.prototype.concat 方法把整个 children 数组打平，让它的深度只有一层。
normalizeChildren 方法的调用场景有 2 种，一个场景是 render 函数是用户手写的，当 children 只有一个节点的时候，Vue.js 从接口层面允许用户把 children 写成基础类型用来创建单个简单的文本节点，这种情况会调用 createTextVNode 创建一个文本节点的 VNode；另一个场景是当编译 slot、v-for 的时候会产生嵌套数组的情况，会调用 normalizeArrayChildren 方法，接下来看一下它的实现：

function normalizeArrayChildren (children: any, nestedIndex?: string): Array<VNode> {
  const res = []
  let i, c, lastIndex, last
  for (i = 0; i < children.length; i++) {
    c = children[i]
    if (isUndef(c) || typeof c === 'boolean') continue
    lastIndex = res.length - 1
    last = res[lastIndex]
    //  nested
    if (Array.isArray(c)) {
      if (c.length > 0) {
        c = normalizeArrayChildren(c, `${nestedIndex || ''}_${i}`)
        // merge adjacent text nodes
        if (isTextNode(c[0]) && isTextNode(last)) {
          res[lastIndex] = createTextVNode(last.text + (c[0]: any).text)
          c.shift()
        }
        res.push.apply(res, c)
      }
    } else if (isPrimitive(c)) {
      if (isTextNode(last)) {
        // merge adjacent text nodes
        // this is necessary for SSR hydration because text nodes are
        // essentially merged when rendered to HTML strings
        res[lastIndex] = createTextVNode(last.text + c)
      } else if (c !== '') {
        // convert primitive to vnode
        res.push(createTextVNode(c))
      }
    } else {
      if (isTextNode(c) && isTextNode(last)) {
        // merge adjacent text nodes
        res[lastIndex] = createTextVNode(last.text + c.text)
      } else {
        // default key for nested array children (likely generated by v-for)
        if (isTrue(children._isVList) &&
          isDef(c.tag) &&
          isUndef(c.key) &&
          isDef(nestedIndex)) {
          c.key = `__vlist${nestedIndex}_${i}__`
        }
        res.push(c)
      }
    }
  }
  return res
}

normalizeArrayChildren方法接收两个参数：

• children：需要规范化的子节点
• nestedIndex：嵌套的索引 normalizeArrayChildren的主要逻辑就是遍历children，然后对每个节点c进行判断，可能有三种情况：
• 如果c节点是个数组，递归调用normalizeArrayChildren方法
• 如果是基础类型，则通过 createTextVNode 方法转换成 VNode 类型
• 否则就已经是 VNode 类型了，如果 children 是一个列表并且列表还存在嵌套的情况，则根据 nestedIndex 去更新它的 key 这里需要注意一点，在遍历的过程中，对这 3 种情况都做了如下处理：如果存在两个连续的 text 节点，会把它们合并成一个 text 节点。

VNode的创建

回到 _createElement 方法中，规范化 children 后，接下来会去创建一个 VNode 的实例：

let vnode, ns
if (typeof tag === 'string') {
  let Ctor
  ns = (context.$vnode && context.$vnode.ns) || config.getTagNamespace(tag)
  if (config.isReservedTag(tag)) {
    // platform built-in elements
    if (process.env.NODE_ENV !== 'production' && isDef(data) && isDef(data.nativeOn) && data.tag !== 'component') {
      warn(
        `The .native modifier for v-on is only valid on components but it was used on <${tag}>.`,
        context
      )
    }
    vnode = new VNode(
      config.parsePlatformTagName(tag), data, children,
      undefined, undefined, context
    )
  } else if ((!data || !data.pre) && isDef(Ctor = resolveAsset(context.$options, 'components', tag))) {
    // component
    vnode = createComponent(Ctor, data, context, children, tag)
  } else {
    // unknown or unlisted namespaced elements
    // check at runtime because it may get assigned a namespace when its
    // parent normalizes children
    vnode = new VNode(
      tag, data, children,
      undefined, undefined, context
    )
  }
} else {
  // direct component options / constructor
  vnode = createComponent(tag, data, context, children)
}
if (Array.isArray(vnode)) {
  return vnode
} else if (isDef(vnode)) {
  if (isDef(ns)) applyNS(vnode, ns)
  if (isDef(data)) registerDeepBindings(data)
  return vnode
} else {
  return createEmptyVNode()
}

这里先对 tag 做判断，如果是 string 类型，则接着判断如果是内置的一些节点，则直接创建一个普通 VNode，如果是为已注册的组件名，则通过 createComponent 创建一个组件类型的 VNode，否则创建一个未知的标签的 VNode。 如果是 tag 一个 Component 类型，则直接调用 createComponent 创建一个组件类型的 VNode 节点。对于 createComponent 创建组件类型的 VNode 的过程，我们之后会去介绍，本质上它还是返回了一个 VNode。