npx breaking on CI?

omrilotan

Oct 27, 2020·2 min read

npm@7 brings fundamental changes to npx, which may break your CI process.

TL;DR

npm_config_yes=true npx <package_name>Need to install the following packages:
  something-runnable@2
Ok to proceed? (y)

npm@7 now uses npm exec as an underline to npx. As a result, your terminal should wait for you to proceed with installation of uninstalled packages. (I’m “standard” as an example, but this applies for all).

npx standard

This is a blocker for CI processes that may start to fail when migrating to npm@7.

The solution should be to use the underlined npm exec —- yes option.

npx --yes standard

Is equivalent to

npm exec standard --yes

The issue with this solution is that npm@6 does not support this flag and will throw an error.

The solution that is compatible for both versions is to set an npm flag “npm_config_yes” which will get picked up by npm@7 and will be ignored by npm@6

npm_config_yes=true npx standard

Hope this helps