pnpm
Performant npm
pnpm is a fast implementation of npm install
. It is loosely based off ied.
Install
Install it via npm.
npm install -g pnpm.js
Use pnpm
in place of npm
. It overrides pnpm i
and pnpm install
—all other commands will passthru to npm
.
pnpm install lodash
Custom registries
pnpm follows whatever is configured as npm registries. To use a custom registry, use npm config
:
# updates ~/.npmrc
npm config set registry http://npmjs.eu
Or to use it for just one command, use environment variables:
env npm_registry=http://npmjs.eu pnpm install
Private registries are supported, as well.
npm config set @mycompany:registry https://npm.mycompany.com
pnpm install @mycompany/foo
Preview release
pnpm
will stay in <1.0.0
until it's achieved feature parity with npm install
.
-
pnpm install
- npm packages
- GitHub-hosted packages (
npm i rstacruz/scourjs
) - @scoped packages (
npm i @rstacruz/tap-spec
) - tarball release packages (
npm i http://foo.com/tar.tgz
) - compiled packages (
npm i node-sass
) - bundled dependencies (
npm i [email protected]
) - optional dependencies (
npm i [email protected]
wantssource-map@~0.2.0
) - install from packages
- file packages (
npm i file:../path
) - bin executables
-
--global
installs -
--save
et al
-
pnpm uninstall
-
pnpm ls
Design
pnpm
maintains a flat storage of all your dependencies in node_modules/.store
. They are then symlinked whereever they're needed.
This is like npm@2
's recursive module handling (without the disk space bloat), and like npm@3
s flat dependency tree (except with each module being predictably atomic).
To illustrate, an installation of chalk@1.1.1 may look like this:
.
└─ node_modules/
├─ .store/
│ ├─ [email protected]/
│ │ └─ node_modules/
│ │ ├─ ansi-styles -> ../../[email protected]/_
│ │ ├─ has-ansi -> ../../[email protected]/_
│ │ └─ supports-color -> ../../[email protected]/_
│ ├─ [email protected]/
│ │ ├─ _/
│ │ └─ node_modules/
│ ├─ [email protected]/
│ │ ├─ _/
│ │ └─ node_modules/
│ └─ [email protected]/
│ ├─ _/
│ └─ node_modules/
└─ chalk -> .store/[email protected]/_
The intermediate _
directories are needed to hide node_modules
from npm utilities like npm ls
, npm prune
, npm shrinkwrap
and so on. The name _
is chosen because it helps make stack traces readable.
Benchmark
time npm i babel-preset-es2015 browserify chalk debug minimist mkdirp
66.15 real 15.60 user 3.54 sys
time pnpm i babel-preset-es2015 browserify chalk debug minimist mkdirp
11.04 real 6.85 user 2.85 sys
Prior art
ied is built on a very similar premise. pnpm
takes huge inspiration from ied.
Unlike ied, however:
pnpm
will eventually be made to support a globally-shared store so you can keep all your npm modules in one place. With this goal in mind,pnpm
also doesn't care much aboutnpm@3
's flat dependency tree style.- pnpm also supports circular dependencies.
- pnpm aims to achieve compatibility with npm utilities (eg, shrinkwrap), and so deviates from ied's store schema (see § Design).
Will pnpm replace npm?
No! pnpm is not a replacement for npm; rather, think of it as a supplement to npm.
It's simply a rewrite of the npm install
command that uses an alternate way to store your modules. It won't reimplement other things npm is used for (publishing, node_modules management, and so on).
Limitations
- Windows is not supported (yet).
npm@3
-style flattened dependency trees are not supported (yet).- You can't install from shrinkwrap (yet).
- Things not ticked off in the to do list are obviously not feature-complete.
Got an idea for workarounds for these issues? Share them.
Thanks
pnpm © 2016+, Rico Sta. Cruz. Released under the MIT License.
Authored and maintained by Rico Sta. Cruz with help from contributors (list).
ricostacruz.com · GitHub @rstacruz · Twitter @rstacruz