I am developing a React Native App, in which I have installed some Packages Locally and some Global and I can see Local and Global Packages via listing them with these Commands:
For Local Packages:
npm list
For Global Packages:
npm list -g
Right now, I am a bit Confused that whether I should install Packages Locally or Globally? What are the pros and cons of installing locally and globally? Also, which one is recommend?
The main difference is where the package is stored on the disk and re-usage.
Local packages are installed in your project directory (/node-modules) depending on your setup.
Global packages are stored somewhere in your user directory. (Varies per system)
Usually, modules used for building/generating files are usually installed globally, The rest are installed locally.
this might be a good read to learn the differences: https://nodejs.dev/learn/npm-global-or-local-packages
Related
I am having difficulties trying to install a development branch of React-Admin packages with NPM in an active project, specifically:
ra-tree-ui-materialui
ra-tree-core
To have the changes made in this PR https://github.com/marmelab/react-admin/pull/3379
Is there any way of doing this in a similar way to how you normally would put this in package.json ("username/repo#branch")
It is difficult to install a local version of one of React Admin's package, because we use a mono-repository that contains all the packages.
I see two solutions to your needs.
Install the alpha builds
The core team had just published an alpha for the next version of React Admin. It's not stable yet, but you can try it by running :
npm install --save ra-tree-core#next
npm install --save ra-tree-ui-materialui#next
Install a local version for development
If you want to tweak the React Admin packages while you are using them, you can fork the whole repo and use symbolic links.
# On a separate folder
git clone git#github.com:marmelab/react-admin.git
cd react-admin
make install
make build
cd packages/ra-tree-core
npm link # This will make this package available for linking
And on your project, then run:
npm link ra-tree-core
This will create a symbolic link between your local ra-tree-core and your node_module folder.
I showed these examples with npm, but yarn link works too.
Does it matter whether you install a global package with yarn global add PACKAGE vs npm install -g PACKAGE ?
Is there any difference at all, like where files are installed?
If yes, what is it?
So yes, you are right it is different. For npm it is something like below
/Users/tarunlalwani/.nvm/versions/node/v9.2.0/lib if you are using nvm
You can get this path using
$ npm config get prefix
/Users/tarunlalwani/.nvm/versions/node/v9.2.0
Where does npm install packages?
While yarn uses other paths
Windows: %LOCALAPPDATA%/Yarn/config/global
OSX and Linux non-root: ~/.config/yarn/global
Linux if logged in as root: /usr/local/share/.config/yarn/global
How to display yarn globally installed packages?
See this thread as well
https://github.com/yarnpkg/yarn/issues/2049
This is the document about Yarn global
yarn global is a prefix used for a number of commands like add, bin,
list and remove. They behave identically to their normal versions
except that they use a global directory to store packages. The global
command makes executables available to use on your operating system
and this is the document about npm install global mode
In global mode (ie, with -g or --global appended to the command), it
installs the current package context (ie, the current working
directory) as a global package.
I think there is no difference between them. Install a package as a global useful for developer tooling that is not part of any individual project but instead is used for local commands
Just found out that yarn does not install same modules again and again in different projects and so you can recover some space from the hard drive, so my question...Is there a way to transfer or migrate npm modules installed globally to yarn and what exactly should be done, in every single project, which previously got it's dependancies through npm?
When developing with Angular, one can
npm install
to install packages locally, or
npm install -g
to install them globally. I am wondering what are the implications of each practice. And what happens if a particular package is installed both ways, perhaps with different versions? Which one will my Angular app use?
From there https://www.quora.com/When-do-I-install-a-package-locally-or-globally-in-NPM
In general, the rule of thumb is:
1. If you’re installing something that you want to use in your program, using
import { 'whatever'}, then install it locally, at the root of your project.
2. If you’re installing something that you want to use in your shell, on the command line or something, install it globally, so that its binaries end up in your PATH environment variable.
When I deploy my app to AWS, it's copied into a new directory, so NPM will install all the same packages, during each deploy, which can take a lot of time. Most of these packages haven't changed between builds (if at all), so having it do a full npm-install seems like a waste.
My app server runs a bunch of different Node apps, so installing globally isn't an option. Instead I'd like to have the app store it's node packages in a location that isn't wiped out during deployment, but have the option to update packages as necessary during npm install.
Does NPM have a concept of an app-specific module directory that isn't located in a subfolder of an app? That way I can delete the app folder, and not have to reinstall the same packages over and over again.
I could achieve this by using symlinks, or migrating the current node_module directory.
If you lock down your dependencies versions, NPM is likely to cache the packages. So the installation wouldn't take much longer.
If you prefer not to do this, you can install dependencies globally and link them with the npm link command (which is basically creating a symlink yourself!). Then, it'll be up to you update the globally installed packages regularly.