title: npm 1.0: The New "ls"
author: Isaac Schlueter
date: Thu Mar 17 2011 23:22:17 GMT-0700 (PDT)
status: publish
category: npm
slug: npm-1-0-the-new-ls
< p > < em > This is the first in a series of hopefully more than 1 posts, each detailing some aspect of npm 1.0.< / em > < / p >
< p > In npm 0.x, the < code > ls< / code > command was a combination of both searching the registry as well as reporting on what you have installed.< / p >
< p > As the registry has grown in size, this has gotten unwieldy. Also, since npm 1.0 manages dependencies differently, nesting them in < code > node_modules< / code > folder and installing locally by default, there are different things that you want to view.< / p >
< p > The functionality of the < code > ls< / code > command was split into two different parts. < code > search< / code > is now the way to find things on the registry (and it only reports one line per package, instead of one line per version), and < code > ls< / code > shows a tree view of the packages that are installed locally.< / p >
< p > Here’ s an example of the output:< / p >
< pre style = "background:#333;color:#ccc;overflow:auto;padding:2px;" > < code > $ npm ls
npm@1.0.0 /Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm
├── semver@1.0.1
├─┬ ronn@0.3.5
│ └── opts@1.2.1
└─┬ express@2.0.0rc3 < span style = "background:#000;color:#0f0;" > extraneous< / span >
├─┬ connect@1.1.0
│ ├── qs@0.0.7
│ └── mime@1.2.1
├── mime@1.2.1
└── qs@0.0.7
< / code > < / pre >
< p > This is after I’ ve done < code > npm install semver ronn express< / code > in the npm source directory. Since express isn’ t actually a dependency of npm, it shows up with that “ extraneous” marker.< / p >
< p > Let’ s see what happens when we create a broken situation:< / p >
< pre style = "background:#333;color:#ccc;overflow:auto;padding:2px;" > < code > $ rm -rf ./node_modules/express/node_modules/connect
$ npm ls
npm@1.0.0 /Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm
├── semver@1.0.1
├─┬ ronn@0.3.5
│ └── opts@1.2.1
└─┬ express@2.0.0rc3 < span style = "background:#000;color:#0f0;" > extraneous< / span >
├── < span style = "background:#000;color:#f00;" > UNMET DEPENDENCY< / span > connect > = 1.1.0 < 2.0.0
├── mime@1.2.1
└── qs@0.0.7
< / code > < / pre >
< p > Tree views are great for human readability, but some times you want to pipe that stuff to another program. For that output, I took the same datastructure, but instead of building up a treeview string for each line, it spits out just the folders like this:< / p >
< pre style = "background:#333;color:#ccc;overflow:auto;padding:2px;" > < code > $ npm ls -p
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/semver
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/ronn
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/ronn/node_modules/opts
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/connect
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/connect/node_modules/qs
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/connect/node_modules/mime
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/mime
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/qs
< / code > < / pre >
< p > Since you sometimes want a bigger view, I added the < code > --long< / code > option to (shorthand: < code > -l< / code > ) to spit out more info:< / p >
< pre style = "background:#333;color:#ccc;overflow:auto;padding:2px;" > < code > $ npm ls -l
npm@1.0.0
│ /Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm
│ A package manager for node
│ git://github.com/isaacs/npm.git
│ http://npmjs.org/
├── semver@1.0.1
│ ./node_modules/semver
│ The semantic version parser used by npm.
│ git://github.com/isaacs/node-semver.git
├─┬ ronn@0.3.5
│ │ ./node_modules/ronn
│ │ markdown to roff and html converter
│ └── opts@1.2.1
│ ./node_modules/ronn/node_modules/opts
│ Command line argument parser written in the style of commonjs. To be used with node.js
└─┬ express@2.0.0rc3 < span style = "background:#000;color:#0f0;" > extraneous< / span >
│ ./node_modules/express
│ Sinatra inspired web development framework
├─┬ connect@1.1.0
│ │ ./node_modules/express/node_modules/connect
│ │ High performance middleware framework
│ │ git://github.com/senchalabs/connect.git
│ ├── qs@0.0.7
│ │ ./node_modules/express/node_modules/connect/node_modules/qs
│ │ querystring parser
│ └── mime@1.2.1
│ ./node_modules/express/node_modules/connect/node_modules/mime
│ A comprehensive library for mime-type mapping
├── mime@1.2.1
│ ./node_modules/express/node_modules/mime
│ A comprehensive library for mime-type mapping
└── qs@0.0.7
./node_modules/express/node_modules/qs
querystring parser
$ npm ls -lp
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm:npm@1.0.0::::
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/semver:semver@1.0.1::::
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/ronn:ronn@0.3.5::::
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/ronn/node_modules/opts:opts@1.2.1::::
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express:express@2.0.0rc3:EXTRANEOUS:::
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/connect:connect@1.1.0::::
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/connect/node_modules/qs:qs@0.0.7::::
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/connect/node_modules/mime:mime@1.2.1::::
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/mime:mime@1.2.1::::
/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/express/node_modules/qs:qs@0.0.7::::
< / code > < / pre >
< p > And, if you want to get at the globally-installed modules, you can use ls with the global flag:< / p >
< pre style = "background:#333;color:#ccc;overflow:auto;padding:2px;" > < code > $ npm ls -g
/usr/local
├─┬ A@1.2.3 -> /Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/A
│ ├── B@1.2.3 -> /Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/B
│ └─┬ npm@0.3.15
│ └── semver@1.0.1
├─┬ B@1.2.3 -> /Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/B
│ └── A@1.2.3 -> /Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/A
├── glob@2.0.5
├─┬ npm@1.0.0 -> /Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm
│ ├── semver@1.0.1
│ └─┬ ronn@0.3.5
│ └── opts@1.2.1
└── supervisor@0.1.2 -> /Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/node-supervisor
$ npm ls -gpl
/usr/local:::::
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/A:A@1.2.3::::/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/A
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/A/node_modules/npm:npm@0.3.15::::/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/A/node_modules/npm
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/A/node_modules/npm/node_modules/semver:semver@1.0.1::::/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/A/node_modules/npm/node_modules/semver
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/B:B@1.2.3::::/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/B
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/glob:glob@2.0.5::::
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm:npm@1.0.0::::/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/semver:semver@1.0.1::::/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/semver
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/ronn:ronn@0.3.5::::/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/ronn
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/ronn/node_modules/opts:opts@1.2.1::::/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/npm/node_modules/ronn/node_modules/opts
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/supervisor:supervisor@0.1.2::::/Users/isaacs/dev-src/js/node-supervisor
< / code > < / pre >
< p > Those < code > -> < / code > flags are indications that the package is link-installed, which will be covered in the next installment.< / p >
