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[BUG] npm v7 breaks itself upon installing itself in --global --production mode. #1708
Description
Current Behavior:
npm 7 is broken after installing itself in --global --production mode.
Expected Behavior:
npm 7 installing itself in --global --production mode should not cause a broken npm install.
Steps To Reproduce:
From a working, stable release of npm, run the following command twice and you will have a broken install of npm.
npm install --global --production npm@next-7npm install --global --production npm@next-7(Once more, with feeling!)
At this point, npm has reinstalled itself in a broken way, and no npm subcommands that I've tried will work.
Environment:
- OS: Ubuntu 20.04
- Node: 14.8.0
- npm: 6.14.7 (for bootstrapping this whole process)
- npm: 7.0.0-beta.6 (reinstalling itself in a broken state)
Activity
ljharb commentedon Aug 23, 2020
Why would you be installing in production mode explicitly? Dev deps only show up if you run
npm installornpm install --dev.DeeDeeG commentedon Aug 23, 2020
I suppose it was from misremembering the facts you just mentioned. Do global installs not include
devDependencies?(EDIT: You appear to be right. I actually can't get npm 6 to install the
devDependenciesat all in--globalmode, even without--productionand running with--also=dev. But that's off-topic for this issue.)In any case, these "steps to reproduce" do not break existing, stable releases of
npm, so I consider it a bug in this beta release, regardless of if the command is a sensible one to run.DeeDeeG commentedon Aug 23, 2020
For better or for worse, I seem to recall that it's a common thing in various READMEs to tell users to do global package installs with the
--productionflag.For example,
node-gyp'sREADME.md: https://github.com/nodejs/node-gyp/tree/v7.1.0#option-1And Node's documentation page: https://nodejs.org/docs/v14.9.0/api/n-api.html#n_api_building
(Probably copy-pasted from
windows-build-tools' ownREADME.md, which has since been updated: felixrieseberg/windows-build-tools@4420dc8)Update: I sent PRs to Node [1] and node-gyp [2] and they're landed. So users in the future won't have the confusion I did about
npm install --global --productionbeing a thing you would want to type.AKASHGJHKJ commentedon Aug 25, 2020
isaacs commentedon Aug 25, 2020
2 remaining items
[-][BUG] npm@7.0.0-beta breaks itself upon installing itself in `--global --production` mode.[/-][+][BUG] npm v7 breaks itself upon installing itself in `--global --production` mode.[/+]DeeDeeG commentedon Oct 20, 2020
Update: This still applies, tested with stable npm@7.0.3.
If you run
npm install -g --production npm@7twice, you will have a broken npm.nlf commentedon Nov 6, 2020
i'm not able to reproduce this, can you try it with 7.0.9?
DeeDeeG commentedon Nov 6, 2020
Hi @nlf, I am still able to reproduce it with npm 7.0.9 on Node 12 and Node 14, but I mostly cannot reproduce it on Node 15.
Strangely, only once I was able to run the command
npm install --global --production npm@7in Node 14 several times in a row, but this seems to be a fluke. Likewise, I was able to reproduce the issue once on Node 15, but usually I can't on Node 15.Maybe this is an intermittent issue. And I do think it happens less often on Node 15. I have a mechanical hard drive if that has anything to do with it? (Speculating if it may be a race condition).
DeeDeeG commentedon Jan 21, 2021
I think this is fixed now, thanks for working on this @nlf!
I tested, and I could not reproduce the bug on the following Node versions:
Tested on my macBook, macOS 10.15.7 Catalina.