NPM

Set Default Config

npm config set init.author.name <name>
npm config set init.author.email <email>

Open Package Home Website

npm home <package>

Go to package code repository

npm repo <package>

Go to package documentation

npm docs <package>

List global packages

List the packages its dependency tree

npm list --global

List only top level packages

npm list -g --depth=0

List outdated packages

npm outdated -d

Clean the cache

npm keeps a copy of all installed packages. Next time the same package is to be installed, npm takes it from the cache and not over the network. All packages are cached in the $HOME/.npm directory.

npm cache clean

Generate package.json with defaults

A package.json file will be created and the name of your directory will be used for the name property.

npm init --yes

Create a link to local package

Create a symlink in the global folder for that package

npm link

You will see that references either via npm list -g --depth=0 or npm outdated -g.

Install local package from directory

npm install path/to/package

This will create:

"dependencies": {
  ...
  "myproject": "file:../myproject/"
}

Update packages in `package.json`

npm i -g npm-check-updates
npm-check-updates -u
npm install

Freeze versions for all dependencies

npm shrinkwrap

This generates a lockfile that specifies the exact version and URL from which to download every single dependency.

shrinkwrap has some serious issues. npm builds dependency tree in a non-deterministic manner. The tree structure can differ from one machine to another based on the order that the packages are downloaded. This leads to problematic side effects.

Issues may arise when two or more dependencies specified in package.json share a common package , especially if their versions are different.

npm-shrinkwrap.json is unreadable and can change in strange ways. If you were to shrinkwrap, delete the file, then shrinkwrap again, the two generated files might be completely different. Upgrading a single dependency might lead to additions, deletions, and the moving of dependencies around in the file that makes it difficult to track changes.

Yarn generates yarn.lock (an equivalent to npm-shrinkwrap.json) Yarn uses this lockfile to generate deterministic builds : they will be the same from machine to machine . Yarn also automatically resolves duplicate dependencies and generates a flat dependency tree.

Show NPM config

$ npm config list
; cli configs
metrics-registry = "https://registry.npmjs.org/"
user-agent = "npm/4.4.4 node/v7.8.0 darwin x64"

; userconfig /Users/zaiste/.npmrc
init.author.name = "Zaiste"
init.version = "0.0.1"
progress = true

; builtin config undefined
prefix = "/usr/local"

; node bin location = /usr/local/Cellar/node/7.8.0/bin/node
; "npm config ls -l" to show all defaults.

npm config get prefix
/usr/local

cd && mkdir .node_modules_global
npm config set prefix=$HOME/.node_modules_global

This also creates a .npmrc file in home directory.

$ npm config get prefix
/home/zaiste/.node_modules_global
$ cat .npmrc
prefix=/home/zaiste/.node_modules_global

$ npm install npm --global

Finally, add .node_modules_global/bin to the $PATH

$ which npm
/home/zaiste/.node_modules_global/bin/npm

NPM