[BUG] Error installing relative paths using workspaces

[lfowlie]

EDIT

See #3847 (comment) for minimum reproduction case. --@wraithgar

---

Is there an existing issue for this?

• I have searched the existing issues

Current Behavior

Running npm install --workspace=<workspace> is resulting in npm exiting with an errorcode and the following stack trace:

290 timing command:install Completed in 2473ms
291 verbose stack TypeError: Cannot set property 'dev' of null
291 verbose stack     at calcDepFlagsStep (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/@npmcli/arborist/lib/calc-dep-flags.js:34:21)
291 verbose stack     at visit (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/@npmcli/arborist/lib/calc-dep-flags.js:12:20)
291 verbose stack     at visitNode (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/treeverse/lib/depth-descent.js:57:25)
291 verbose stack     at next (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/treeverse/lib/depth-descent.js:44:19)
291 verbose stack     at depth (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/treeverse/lib/depth-descent.js:82:10)
291 verbose stack     at depth (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/treeverse/lib/depth.js:27:12)
291 verbose stack     at calcDepFlags (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/@npmcli/arborist/lib/calc-dep-flags.js:10:15)
291 verbose stack     at Arborist.[copyIdealToActual] (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/@npmcli/arborist/lib/arborist/reify.js:1375:7)
291 verbose stack     at Arborist.reify (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/@npmcli/arborist/lib/arborist/reify.js:151:35)
291 verbose stack     at async Install.install (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/lib/install.js:170:5)
292 verbose cwd /usr/src
293 verbose Linux 5.10.47-linuxkit
294 verbose argv "/usr/local/bin/node" "/usr/local/bin/npm" "install" "--workspace=scheduler"
295 verbose node v14.16.1
296 verbose npm  v7.24.2
297 error Cannot set property 'dev' of null
298 verbose exit 1

Dockerfile for container I'm running the command in:

FROM node:14.16.1
RUN npm install -g npm@7.24.2

RUN mkdir -p /usr/src/
WORKDIR /usr/src

COPY ./package.json /usr/src/
COPY ./scheduler/package.json /usr/src/scheduler/
RUN npm install --workspace=scheduler

node_modules seem to successfully install but npm exits with an error code

Expected Behavior

npm install completes without raising an error

Steps To Reproduce

1. Setup an npm project with workspaces
2. Create a docker container according to the above specifications, with one of the commands attempting to run npm install for a specific workspace
3. Attempt to build the container
4. npm installs node_modules successfully but exits with error

Environment

• OS: Debian GNU/Linux 9 (stretch)
• Node: 14.16.1
• npm: 7.24.2

[niekcandaele]

Had the same issue but with npm ci --only=production --workspaces.

However, the command was working locally for me. It failed inside Docker. So I compared my host environment to the Docker one and noticed the NPM versions were slightly different.

FROM node:16-alpine # Uses NPM v7.24.0

Locally I was using v7.18.1.

FROM node:16-alpine as runner

RUN npm install -g npm@7.18.1

# < project specific stuff here >

RUN npm ci --only=production --workspaces

CMD [ "npm", "start" ]

Works :)

Hope this helps narrowing down the issue.

[Pitasi]

I have this same problem using npm@7.24 and npm@8.

Works fine with npm@7.18.1.

[lfowlie]

Thanks for the comments @niekcandaele and @Pitasi. I'll try 7.18.1 and see if that works

[lfowlie]

Verified that npm@7.18.1 does work, thanks!! Leaving open as this should probably be fixed for newer versions

[mlaopane]

I had the same issue with npm@8.1.0 and the error disappeared with npm@7.18.1.
However I managed to make it work with npm@8.1.0 by fixing my Dockerfile.
The issue came from missing workspaces package.json which were dependencies of the package I was trying to install.

In my case, given that home-ui depends on core, I did the following fixes :

Before

FROM node:16-buster

COPY package*.json ./
COPY packages/home-ui/package.json ./packages/home-ui/

RUN npm ci -w packages/home-ui

After

FROM node:16-buster

COPY package*.json ./
COPY packages/core/package.json ./packages/core/
COPY packages/home-ui/package.json ./packages/home-ui/

RUN npm ci -w packages/home-ui

[chriskinsman]

Hitting this same issue using workspaces with npm@8.1.2 and npm@8.3.2

npm ERR! Cannot set properties of null (setting 'dev')

[Pavel-Husakouski]

npm@8.3.2 from time to time return this error on the package adding but the next attempt is always successful.

[dsuresh-ap]

Is there any workaround for this issue without downgrading to npm 7.18?

[winston0410]

+1 any workaround for this issue?

[orvn]

This still seems to be an issue in npm 8, so I reverted to node 16.4.2, which was the last version to ship with npm 7.18.

An alternative when installing a workspace as a dependency of another workspace is to just write the directory path into the package.json of the workspace that wants the dependency. This works with npm 8, but I opted to stay on the safe side and keep 7.18 to avoid potential future problems.

{
  "dependencies": {
    "@my-project/another-workspace": "file:packages/another-workspace"
}

[Pavel-Husakouski]

Another similar issue with node 17.3 npm 8.3.2: Cannot set properties of null (setting 'peer')
The workaround is to delete the node_modules folder at the root package folder.