resolve-package-path

What is resolve-package-path?

The resolve-package-path npm package is used to resolve the path of a package in the node_modules directory. It helps in finding the exact location of a package, which can be useful for various purposes such as loading configurations, plugins, or dependencies dynamically.

What are resolve-package-path's main functionalities?

Resolve package path

This feature allows you to resolve the path of a given package from the node_modules directory. In this example, it resolves the path of the 'express' package from the current working directory.

const resolvePackagePath = require('resolve-package-path');
const packagePath = resolvePackagePath('express', process.cwd());
console.log(packagePath);

Resolve package path with custom base directory

This feature allows you to resolve the path of a package from a custom base directory. In this example, it resolves the path of the 'express' package from a specified custom base directory.

const resolvePackagePath = require('resolve-package-path');
const packagePath = resolvePackagePath('express', '/path/to/custom/base/directory');
console.log(packagePath);

Resolve package path with cache

This feature allows you to resolve the path of a package with caching. The cache helps in improving performance by storing previously resolved paths. In this example, it resolves the path of the 'express' package with a cache.

const resolvePackagePath = require('resolve-package-path');
const cache = new Map();
const packagePath = resolvePackagePath('express', process.cwd(), cache);
console.log(packagePath);

Other packages similar to resolve-package-path

resolve

The 'resolve' package is used to resolve the path of a module like Node's require.resolve() but with more features. It can resolve paths based on custom file extensions, directories, and more. Compared to resolve-package-path, 'resolve' offers more flexibility and options for resolving module paths.

pkg-dir

The 'pkg-dir' package finds the root directory of a Node.js project or a package. It is useful for locating the root directory of a project or a package, which can then be used to resolve paths relative to that root. While resolve-package-path focuses on resolving the path of a specific package, 'pkg-dir' helps in finding the root directory of a project or package.

find-up

The 'find-up' package is used to find a file or directory by walking up parent directories. It is useful for locating configuration files or other resources that may be located in parent directories. Compared to resolve-package-path, 'find-up' is more general-purpose and can be used to find any file or directory, not just package paths.

README

resolve-package-path

This project is special-purpose, made to resolve package.json files for:

• a given module name and basedir or
• a given basedir

It cannot and does not resolve anything else.

To achieve its file-resolution performance, it does two specific things:

• It memoizes results identically to node's require. Specifically, for a given moduleName and baseDir it will, for the duration of the process, always return the exact same response.

• It re-implements the parts of require.resolve needed to resolve package.json files ONLY. This removes unneeded I/O. (based on @davecombs approach)

Usage

yarn add resolve-package-path

const resolvePackagePath = require('resolve-package-path');

resolvePackagePath('rsvp', 'base-dir/to/start/the/node_resolution-algorithm-from') // => /path/to/rsvp.json or null

const { findUpPackagePath } = resolvePackagePath;
findUpPackagePath('base-dir/to/start') // => path/to/package.json or null

Advanced usage

Preserve Symlinks

Node supports --preserve-symlinks and NODE_PRESERVE_SYMLINKS=1 for compatibility this library respects these.

Disable default caching

Although by default resolve-package-path caches or memoizes results, this feature can be disabled:

const resolvePackagePath = require('resolve-package-path');

resolvePackagePath('rsvp', 'base-dir/to/start/the/node_resolution-algorithm-from', false) // => uncached result /path/to/rsvp.json or null

const { findUpPackagePath } = resolvePackagePath;
findUpPackagePath('base-dir/to/start', false) // => path/to/package.json or null

Purge the cache

const resolvePackagePath = require('resolve-package-path');
resolvePackagePath._resetCache();

Provide an alternative cache

In some advanced circumtances, you may want to gain access to the cache to share between more systems. In that case, a cache instance of the following form can be provided as a third argument:

cache = {
  RESOLVED_PACKAGE_PATH: new Map(),
  REAL_FILE_PATH: new Map(),
  REAL_DIRECTORY_PATH: new Map(),
};
findUpCache = new Map();

const resolvePackagePath = require('resolve-package-path');
resolvePackagePath('rsvp', 'path/to/start/from', cache);

const { findUpPackagePath } = resolvePackagePath;
findUpPackagePath('base-dir/to/start', findUpCache) // => path/to/package.json or null

Use internal helper functions

For consumers who also do getRealFilePath or getRealDirectoryPath calls on relevant paths, we expose them as utilities. These utilties ensure identical functionality to resolve-package-path, and a shared cache, which may help reduce IO.