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Maybe I'm completely out of the loop, but what's the deal with running multiple versions of Node? What particular problems or projects do you have where this i

Maybe I'm completely out of the loop, but what's the deal with running multiple versions of Node? What particular problems or projects do you have where this is a pressing necessity? I just install latest LTS and keep that up to date, and I've yet to find a single thing not working.

badhombres 8y ago
When I write lambda code for my job, our code currently only supports the node 6 for it's runtime (our system automatically deploys it). I use nvm to help test my code all the time while still having the ability to switch to a more current node for other projects
- devmunchies 8y ago
  Are you running your projects directly on your machine? Your’re not using a VM or containers? Don’t you have the “but it works on my machine” problem?
  - maktouch 8y ago
    We never had that issue with node
  - badhombres 8y ago
    We only run it for quick tests. This is custom code that our main application uses for custom logic that is different for each customer. We can't build it into the main product because not everyone wants/needs it. We always test on the lambdas directly, but we just dev on our machine as that's sometimes quicker.
schroffl 8y ago
It's nice to have this when you need to debug issues which only occur on certain versions. A good example would be the recent change of the c++ addon api, which caused my code to crash on some installations while it worked fine on others.
csixty4 8y ago
For us, it's about developing on the same node version used in production. That's necessary if you're not deploying to a containerized environment or you're using something completely out of your control like AWS Lambda.
giancarlostoro 8y ago
Sometimes you're limited in production by whatever version the OS supports. In the case of Debian installing nodejs doesn't necessarily land you the latest and greatest. The same happens with Python as well. I wish they had a good way to abstract this in Debian and I'm surprised Ubuntu hasn't fully resolved it, I mean Ubuntu does have Snap but I can't trust Snaps fully if the language vendors aren't backing the only available Snaps. But to account for systems where the only version of Node or Python, or whatever is a specific version, you need systems like this.
- jjuel 8y ago
  You can absolutely install the newest version of Python and Node on Debian. It is a little harder than just an `apt-get install`, but very possible.
  - Spivak 8y ago
    Of course you can install it. In many environments it's not considered maintainable to deviate from the distro provided and supported version. Especially when you have support contracts from your OS vendor. If devs want something different from the distro provided libs we typically ask that they use containers or otherwise vendor them. Ideally we would like our software to depend on the system for the bare minimum and security critical libs like OpenSSL so that Ops is free to switch out the underlying platform with minimal friction.
- h1d 8y ago
  Why don't you just install the official 'deb' package with the version of your choice? https://github.com/nodesource/distributions/blob/master/README.md#debinstall https://github.com/nodesource/distributions/blob/master/READ...
bepvte 8y ago
the main reason i use nvm is because its the only way i can use npm i -g.....
- josteink 8y ago
  You dont need to nvm to do that. You just need to set an alternate "global" path inside your home-directory, instead of one in /usr/lib/node which requires root. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/14742553/how-to-set-custom-location-for-local-installation-of-npm-package https://stackoverflow.com/questions/14742553/how-to-set-cust...
Touche 8y ago
Here's a couple of use cases: You maintain a library and you support more than just the latest version of Node. You switch to test compatibility. You work on a project with a team. Some members of the team work on other projects with other versions of Node. They need to be able to switch.
h1d 8y ago
I have a development server that has some projects mainly written by someone else and one of them specify an old version of nodejs as dependency which breaks by using latest LTS (and I'm too lazy to figure out how to make someone else's code to work on latest LTS) but I don't want to turn nodejs for the entire server to an old LTS.

badhombres 8y ago

When I write lambda code for my job, our code currently only supports the node 6 for it's runtime (our system automatically deploys it). I use nvm to help test my code all the time while still having the ability to switch to a more current node for other projects

devmunchies 8y ago
Are you running your projects directly on your machine? Your’re not using a VM or containers? Don’t you have the “but it works on my machine” problem?
- maktouch 8y ago
  We never had that issue with node
- badhombres 8y ago
  We only run it for quick tests. This is custom code that our main application uses for custom logic that is different for each customer. We can't build it into the main product because not everyone wants/needs it. We always test on the lambdas directly, but we just dev on our machine as that's sometimes quicker.

schroffl 8y ago

It's nice to have this when you need to debug issues which only occur on certain versions. A good example would be the recent change of the c++ addon api, which caused my code to crash on some installations while it worked fine on others.

csixty4 8y ago

For us, it's about developing on the same node version used in production. That's necessary if you're not deploying to a containerized environment or you're using something completely out of your control like AWS Lambda.

giancarlostoro 8y ago

Sometimes you're limited in production by whatever version the OS supports. In the case of Debian installing nodejs doesn't necessarily land you the latest and greatest. The same happens with Python as well. I wish they had a good way to abstract this in Debian and I'm surprised Ubuntu hasn't fully resolved it, I mean Ubuntu does have Snap but I can't trust Snaps fully if the language vendors aren't backing the only available Snaps. But to account for systems where the only version of Node or Python, or whatever is a specific version, you need systems like this.

jjuel 8y ago
You can absolutely install the newest version of Python and Node on Debian. It is a little harder than just an `apt-get install`, but very possible.
- Spivak 8y ago
  Of course you can install it. In many environments it's not considered maintainable to deviate from the distro provided and supported version. Especially when you have support contracts from your OS vendor. If devs want something different from the distro provided libs we typically ask that they use containers or otherwise vendor them. Ideally we would like our software to depend on the system for the bare minimum and security critical libs like OpenSSL so that Ops is free to switch out the underlying platform with minimal friction.
h1d 8y ago
Why don't you just install the official 'deb' package with the version of your choice? https://github.com/nodesource/distributions/blob/master/README.md#debinstall https://github.com/nodesource/distributions/blob/master/READ...

bepvte 8y ago

the main reason i use nvm is because its the only way i can use npm i -g.....

josteink 8y ago
You dont need to nvm to do that. You just need to set an alternate "global" path inside your home-directory, instead of one in /usr/lib/node which requires root. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/14742553/how-to-set-custom-location-for-local-installation-of-npm-package https://stackoverflow.com/questions/14742553/how-to-set-cust...

Touche 8y ago

Here's a couple of use cases: You maintain a library and you support more than just the latest version of Node. You switch to test compatibility. You work on a project with a team. Some members of the team work on other projects with other versions of Node. They need to be able to switch.

h1d 8y ago

I have a development server that has some projects mainly written by someone else and one of them specify an old version of nodejs as dependency which breaks by using latest LTS (and I'm too lazy to figure out how to make someone else's code to work on latest LTS) but I don't want to turn nodejs for the entire server to an old LTS.