bin-links

bin-links

bin-links is a standalone library that links binaries and man pages for JavaScript packages

Install

$ npm install bin-links

Table of Contents

• Example
• Features
• Contributing
• API
  • binLinks
  • binLinks.getPaths()
  • binLinks.checkBins()

Example

const binLinks = require('bin-links')
const readPackageJson = require('read-package-json-fast')
binLinks({
  path: '/path/to/node_modules/some-package',
  pkg: readPackageJson('/path/to/node_modules/some-package/package.json'),

  // true if it's a global install, false for local.  default: false
  global: true,

  // true if it's the top level package being installed, false otherwise
  top: true,

  // true if you'd like to recklessly overwrite files.
  force: true,
})

Features

• Links bin files listed under the bin property of pkg to the node_modules/.bin directory of the installing environment. (Or ${prefix}/bin for top level global packages on unix, and ${prefix} for top level global packages on Windows.)
• Links man files listed under the man property of pkg to the share/man directory. (This is only done for top-level global packages on Unix systems.)

Contributing

The npm team enthusiastically welcomes contributions and project participation! There's a bunch of things you can do if you want to contribute! The Contributor Guide has all the information you need for everything from reporting bugs to contributing entire new features. Please don't hesitate to jump in if you'd like to, or even ask us questions if something isn't clear.

API

> binLinks({path, pkg, force, global, top})

Returns a Promise that resolves when the requisite things have been linked.

> binLinks.getPaths({path, pkg, global, top })

Returns an array of all the paths of links and shims that might be created (assuming that they exist!) for the package at the specified path.

Does not touch the filesystem.

> binLinks.checkBins({path, pkg, global, top, force })

Checks if there are any conflicting bins which will prevent the linking of bins for the given package. Returns a Promise that resolves with no value if the way is clear, and rejects if there's something in the way.

Always returns successfully if global or top are false, or if force is true, or if the pkg object does not contain any bins to link.

Note that changes to the file system may still cause the binLinks method to fail even if this method succeeds. Does not check for conflicting man links.

Reads from the filesystem but does not make any changes.

Example

binLinks({path, pkg, force, global, top}).then(() => console.log('bins linked!'))

Changelog

6.0.0 (2025-10-23)

⚠️ BREAKING CHANGES

• bin-links now supports node ^20.17.0 || >=22.9.0

Bug Fixes

• c9a1234 #155 align to npm 11 node engine range (@owlstronaut)

Dependencies

• efcd20a #155 write-file-atomic@7.0.0
• 420e37e #155 read-cmd-shim@6.0.0
• 7c3e533 #155 npm-normalize-package-bin@5.0.0
• cd743b9 #155 proc-log@6.0.0
• 90efc68 #155 cmd-shim@8.0.0

Chores

• 4263d38 #155 template-oss-apply (@owlstronaut)
• d4631bf #142 postinstall workflow updates (#142) (@owlstronaut)
• 6aa852d #148 bump @npmcli/template-oss from 4.26.0 to 4.27.1 (#148) (@dependabot[bot], @npm-cli-bot)

Similar packages

Other packages similar to bin-links

cmd-shim

The cmd-shim package is similar to bin-links in that it creates shim scripts for node modules to be used as command-line tools. Unlike bin-links, cmd-shim is focused on creating shims compatible with Windows as well as Unix systems.

npm-link

npm-link is a package that provides functionality to symlink a package folder during development. While it serves a different purpose from bin-links, which links binaries, npm-link is used to link the entire package for development purposes.