@satispunk/packagelink

npm link alternative tool

Use case

There are two main points why this I created this package:

• Link local packages in a consumer application in scenarios where npm link does not work well.
• Be able to run local packages in CI environment skipping package publishing to npm repository.

Problem with npm link

Though npm link is great tool, it does not work well in some scenarios. If local package has dependencies react or react-redux then those dependencies will be bundled and used twice, as webpack finds modules by its real path.

How does it work

There are two modes publish and install. You can publish packages from local repository to the OS temp directory. Each published package is packed to a corresponding *.tgz file. Then you can install packages in a consumer application. Each installed *.tgz file is copied to a consumer application folder.

Example

Installation

npm install --save-dev @satispunk/packagelink

or install it globally

npm install -g @satispunk/packagelink

Single package

• run packagelink publish from the local package root folder where package.json is present.
• run packagelink install my-package-name from the consumer application root folder.

Mono repository

Installing multiple packages 1 by 1 from mono repository might be annoying. So there is configuration file that can help automate things.

• create packagelink.config.js in the local package root folder
• specify paths to packages you want to publish. for lerna monorepo it could be:

const path = require('path');
const glob = require('glob');

module.exports = {
  publish: {
    packages: glob.sync(path.resolve(__dirname, 'packages/*')),
  },
}

• run packagelink publish. if packages are present in config it will try to publish them instead of using package.json file.
• create packagelink.config.js in the consumer application root folder
• specify dependencies you would like to install

module.exports = {
  install : {
    dependencies: [
      'my-package1',
    ],
    devDependencies: [
      'my-package2',
    ]
  },
}

• run packagelink install

CLI

packagelink publish

Publish local packages based packagelink.config.js or package.json

packagelink install [packageName] [--dev]

Install packages based packagelink.config.js or provided packageName argument. If --dev is set, packages is installed as devDependency.

Config

For publish

const path = require('path');
const glob = require('glob');

module.exports = {
  publish: {
    packages: glob.sync(path.resolve(__dirname, 'packages/*')),
  },
}

For install

module.exports = {
  install : {
    dependencies: [
      'my-package1',
    ],
    devDependencies: [
      'my-package2',
    ]
  },
}