4 ms·

I disagree. I think node is unlike anything we've seen thus far. It's not php, it's not python and it's not ruby. I, literally, cannot rebuild my application

I disagree. I think node is unlike anything we've seen thus far. It's not php, it's not python and it's not ruby. I, literally, cannot rebuild my application from a year and a half ago that is standard node + npm. The deps are broken...the code won't build with node-gyp...i mean node-waf...i mean who knows? What a mess and a HUGE regret.

username223 11y ago
> I, literally, cannot rebuild my application from a year and a half ago... The deps are broken... Welcome to the Cloud Future Web 3.0, where every library you use is maintained like some random guy's personal homepage, and his robots.txt prevents you from caching a stable copy.
EvanPlaice 11y ago
I don't understand this argument. If you know what parts of your site the deps will effect it should be trivial to update them incrementally and rollback the commit if one unexpectedly breaks your code. Besides, there's no universal unwritten rule stating that you have to use the bleeding edge version of every dependency. Keeping all dependencies up-to-date is mostly in the interest of widely used libraries not one-off applications.
- startling 11y ago
  Not sure what the OP's problem was, but I've had issues with old libraries where some dependencies have been removed from npmjs.com. It's totally ridiculous.
  - gkya 11y ago
    So it's not immutable? Blinkin' egg, I'm happy I only played with node.js now. On the other hand, I guess it's always better to vendor one's deps, at least those that are not packaged by the operating systems. The language specific package managers add a lot of complexity.
  - lisivka 11y ago
    I solve such problem for our clients by packaging every dependency we use in project as independent RPM package, so whole application can be installed using single "yum install ..." command from local repository without need to connect to internet. It allows us to precisely control version of libraries we use and also allows to apply patches to them when a problem is found.
  - givehimagun 11y ago
    I haven't seen the disappearing libraries from registry. I did find a few libraries that have been completely abandoned...like 2/3 of the libraries I used.
- givehimagun 11y ago
  I went as far as pulling the node_modules directory from production and perfectly matching the node version on my local machine. Linux -> linux and the app won't run locally. I think it's because the node-gyp influenced deps need to be built locally and linked to the right libs. I then spent a few hours downgrading each version to isolate the issue...found a few libraries that were hard-deprecated (which was nice), found some breaking changes in the node version I'm using and then I just gave up.

username223 11y ago

> I, literally, cannot rebuild my application from a year and a half ago... The deps are broken... Welcome to the Cloud Future Web 3.0, where every library you use is maintained like some random guy's personal homepage, and his robots.txt prevents you from caching a stable copy.

EvanPlaice 11y ago

I don't understand this argument. If you know what parts of your site the deps will effect it should be trivial to update them incrementally and rollback the commit if one unexpectedly breaks your code. Besides, there's no universal unwritten rule stating that you have to use the bleeding edge version of every dependency. Keeping all dependencies up-to-date is mostly in the interest of widely used libraries not one-off applications.

startling 11y ago
Not sure what the OP's problem was, but I've had issues with old libraries where some dependencies have been removed from npmjs.com. It's totally ridiculous.
- gkya 11y ago
  So it's not immutable? Blinkin' egg, I'm happy I only played with node.js now. On the other hand, I guess it's always better to vendor one's deps, at least those that are not packaged by the operating systems. The language specific package managers add a lot of complexity.
- lisivka 11y ago
  I solve such problem for our clients by packaging every dependency we use in project as independent RPM package, so whole application can be installed using single "yum install ..." command from local repository without need to connect to internet. It allows us to precisely control version of libraries we use and also allows to apply patches to them when a problem is found.
- givehimagun 11y ago
  I haven't seen the disappearing libraries from registry. I did find a few libraries that have been completely abandoned...like 2/3 of the libraries I used.
givehimagun 11y ago
I went as far as pulling the node_modules directory from production and perfectly matching the node version on my local machine. Linux -> linux and the app won't run locally. I think it's because the node-gyp influenced deps need to be built locally and linked to the right libs. I then spent a few hours downgrading each version to isolate the issue...found a few libraries that were hard-deprecated (which was nice), found some breaking changes in the node version I'm using and then I just gave up.