symlink

symlink

• Have lots of personal node modules?
• Do you npm link them together to ensure they all work with latest while developing?
• Find the process of linking together multiple modules tedious? (fresh os install / new build environment checkout)

If you answered YES to all the above, then this module is for you.

Usage

Install, then run in the directory containing all your repos that youd like to link together (will take all folders that contain a package.json)

npm install -g symlink
symlink repoDir1 repoDir2 ..

What it does

• reads the package.json of each module founds in the repo dirs and collects their dependencies and devDependencies
• figures out which deps are local to repoDir
• figures out which deps are external
• orders the modules so that linking can be in a safe order without having to query npmjs.org more than necessary

Once everything has been ordered, a bunch of child processes are executed in series for each module from the order of least inclusion;

• npm link ((globals ∩ externalDeps) ∪ (localDeps))
• npm install (externalDeps ∖ globals)
• npm link

I.e. link in all globally installed modules that were specified explicitly and the locally available dependencies in the directories, install the rest, then link the module itself so the modules with more inclusions can safely link the module in.

Example

When I reinstall my linux, I git clone all my repos and let symlink figure out a safe order of commands and perform the following list of actions sequentially via child_process;

# NB: for readability the full paths have been shortened
kjttks@clux ~/repos $ symlink . -g tap -d
[
 "cd ./blog && npm install marked ecstatic promzard async browserify ejs",
 "cd ./blog && npm link",
 "cd ./confortable && npm link tap",
 "cd ./confortable && npm link",
 "cd ./decay && npm link tap",
 "cd ./decay && npm link",
 "cd ./fsx && npm link",
 "cd ./irc-stream && npm link tap",
 "cd ./irc-stream && npm install irc",
 "cd ./irc-stream && npm link",
 "cd ./operators && npm link tap",
 "cd ./operators && npm link",
 "cd ./autonomy && npm link tap operators",
 "cd ./autonomy && npm link",
 "cd ./combustion && npm link tap confortable fsx autonomy operators",
 "cd ./combustion && npm install optimist",
 "cd ./combustion && npm link",
 "cd ./sdp-transform && npm link tap",
 "cd ./sdp-transform && npm link",
 "cd ./splitter && npm link tap",
 "cd ./splitter && npm link",
 "cd ./statesoftheworld && npm link tap",
 "cd ./statesoftheworld && npm link",
 "cd ./subset && npm link tap",
 "cd ./subset && npm link",
 "cd ./curvefever-stats && npm link tap subset confortable",
 "cd ./curvefever-stats && npm install request cheerio async",
 "cd ./curvefever-stats && npm link",
 "cd ./interlude && npm link tap autonomy subset operators",
 "cd ./interlude && npm link",
 "cd ./symlink && npm link tap interlude",
 "cd ./symlink && npm install async optimist",
 "cd ./symlink && npm link",
 "cd ./testling-html-example && npm link",
 "cd ./testling-server-example && npm install tape",
 "cd ./testling-server-example && npm link",
 "cd ./topiary && npm link",
 "cd ./tournament && npm link tap interlude",
 "cd ./tournament && npm link",
 "cd ./tournament-components && npm link tournament",
 "cd ./tournament-components && npm install tape",
 "cd ./tournament-components && npm link",
 "cd ./trials && npm link tap",
 "cd ./trials && npm link",
 "cd ./dye && npm link tap trials subset",
 "cd ./dye && npm link",
 "cd ./tub && npm link tap splitter",
 "cd ./tub && npm install dev-null",
 "cd ./tub && npm link",
 "cd ./typr && npm link tap",
 "cd ./typr && npm link",
 "cd ./logule && npm link tap dye autonomy subset confortable typr",
 "cd ./logule && npm link",
 "cd ./gu && npm link tap logule",
 "cd ./gu && npm install hot-reload",
 "cd ./gu && npm link",
 "cd ./cleverbot-irc && npm link dye gu irc-stream confortable",
 "cd ./cleverbot-irc && npm install levenshtein cleverbot-node suncalc irc-colors",
 "cd ./cleverbot-irc && npm link",
 "cd ./curvefever-bot && npm link tap curvefever-stats gu confortable",
 "cd ./curvefever-bot && npm link",
 "cd ./meshrtc && npm link logule",
 "cd ./meshrtc && npm install shoe emit-stream bean bonzo qwery domready ecstatic mux-demux pause-stream dnode browserify",
 "cd ./meshrtc && npm link",
 "cd ./wolfram-alpha && npm link tap",
 "cd ./wolfram-alpha && npm install request libxmljs",
 "cd ./wolfram-alpha && npm link",
 "cd ./wolfram-irc && npm link gu irc-stream confortable wolfram-alpha",
 "cd ./wolfram-irc && npm link",
 "cd ./wrappers && npm link tap",
 "cd ./wrappers && npm link"
]

Without the dry-run -d flag, these commands would be executed sequentially in this order.

The most independent modules gets their missing dependencies installed first, then gets npm linked so the more requiring modules can npm link in these.

If you have a local/chowned install of node (such that creating links to globally installed modules can be done sans-sudo) then symlink can run sudo free too.

Globally linked modules

If you want to use one globally available package everywhere, say tap for tests, then you can specify -g tap to npm link tap in all modules that has tap listed as a dependency.

Try before you buy

After cloning a bunch of node git repos, you can see how it would link these together first by running symlink with the dry-run -d flag.

License

MIT-Licensed. See LICENSE file for details.