Is there a way to automatically install node.js dependencies from a .js file?

Question

If I have a foo.js node script, is there a way for me to automatically install all the npm dependencies?

e.g. If foo.js had this:

var program = require('commander');
var cheerio = require('cheerio');

Is there any npm command or something that I could do that would read foo.js and do 'npm install commander;npm install cheerio'?

to install the dependencies `automatically` , first of all list them `manually` in `package.json` file and run the `npm install`(sometimes `sudo npm install`) command. — Lekhnath, Mar 02 '14 at 07:54
Possible duplicate of [Is it possible to automatically install the required modules for a node.js script?](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/14226025/is-it-possible-to-automatically-install-the-required-modules-for-a-node-js-scrip) — Anderson Green, Sep 10 '16 at 01:17

Ayush · Accepted Answer · 2014-03-02T07:36:45.757

16

List your dependencies in a package.json file. You can then run npm install to install all dependencies.

Here's an example of a package.json file. Notice how dependencies are defined:

{
  "name": "best-practices",
  "description": "A package using versioning best-practices",
  "author": "Charlie Robbins <charlie@nodejitsu.com>",
  "dependencies": {
    "colors": "0.x.x",
    "express": "2.3.x",
    "optimist": "0.2.x"
  },
  "devDependencies": {
    "vows": "0.5.x"
  },
  "engine": "node >= 0.4.1"
}

Source: https://blog.nodejitsu.com/package-dependencies-done-right/

edited Mar 02 '14 at 07:36

answered Mar 02 '14 at 07:29

Ayush

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Thank you for the answer and useful link, let me read up on it! I was (naively?) hoping there was a programmatic way to extract the dependencies from the .js file itself. I'll read through the package dependencies link you posted. – sivano Mar 02 '14 at 13:49

score 9 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 10 '17 at 15:15

9

There is now a tool that auto-installs required dependencies as you code.

It's called auto-install.

answered Feb 10 '17 at 15:15

Christian Maioli M.

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score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Nov 23 '17 at 09:30

0

npm-install-peers is a npm package that will detect peers and install them.

Note that you should install it globally

answered Nov 23 '17 at 09:30

Luca C.

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Is there a way to automatically install node.js dependencies from a .js file?

3 Answers3