How to change shell of npm install

Question

I'm trying to npm install a package in Ubuntu 16.04. I get the following error message:

npm install 

...

> padlock@2.0.0-beta.1 bower-install /home/kent/Documents/padlock
> pushd app && bower install && popd app

sh: 1: pushd: not found

My Research

According to /bin/sh: pushd: not found, my problem is clearly that npm install is trying to execute pushd with sh not bash.

However, my default shell is already bash

$ env | grep SHELL
SHELL=/bin/bash
$ echo $SHELL
/bin/bash
$ echo $0
bash

and I'm not sure what I need to change. I've also tried adding SHELL=/bin/bash before I execute pushd app but I have had no luck with that either.

Try to use `ls -al /bin/bash` to see if `bash` is linked to other shell. — CWLiu, Aug 11 '17 at 08:24

Robo · Accepted Answer · 2018-03-22T03:55:21.517

4

npm-scripts run using sh

Scripts are run by passing the line as a script argument to sh

https://docs.npmjs.com/misc/scripts#exiting

If you want to use bash for your scripts make the script

bash -c 'pushd app && bower install && popd'

Update: As of November 2017 you can now set script-shell in .npmrc to use a custom shell

edited Mar 22 '18 at 03:55

answered Aug 11 '17 at 08:51

Robo

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4
10

Interesting...how did the padlock developers think pushd would just work then? – Kent Shikama Aug 11 '17 at 10:34
`sh` is bash on some systems but on debian based systems it's dash – Robo Aug 11 '17 at 10:36
Interesting workaround, but not the answer to the question, "How to change shell of npm install?" – MarkHu Mar 21 '18 at 18:45
@MarkHu Well the answer is you can't without potentially ruining your operating system. – Robo Mar 22 '18 at 03:54

score 3 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 21 '18 at 19:00

I was able to work around a similar situation by creating this file in my project directory:

$ cat .npmrc

script-shell=/bin/bash

FWIW, the issue I stumbled upon was relying on bash-specific "curly-brace expansion" commands in the postinstall section of the package.json file for the offending module. That malformed command works in MacOS, but not Linux.

How to change shell of npm install

My Research

2 Answers2