Package Manager Basics: Installing NPM with NVM

Package Managers

NPM is probably the best known package manager for setting up and running a

project. When is installed, gets installed with it, so there is no need to install separately. NPM sets up the development environment of your project, which in our case we are using hardhat as our development environment, and installs important dependencies, which are other pieces of software that are needed to help the core software of the project run. Examples of dependencies are OpenZeppelin/contracts, ethers.js, chai or typescript.

Choose your operating system and setup from the choices below:

Installing node.js and npm with nvm on Windows 10/WSL2

If your operating system is Windows 10 or 11 and you have not installed WSL-2 yet, Microsoft has a pretty good article that can help you install Linux on your Windows machine here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/install . One minor change to the directions should be to the commands to add a specific distribution. You will want to choose the Ubuntu Linux distribution, so you will want to use the following command when installing WSL with the command line,

. This will ensure that a long-term supported version of Ubuntu Linux is installed on WSL-2. If you need additional info, you can also refer to the Tooling section of Lesson 2, which gives direction on operating systems, a command line mini-lesson and more.

Let’s get the party started and install

on WSL2!

Click on the Window, then open Ubuntu 20.04 on Windows.

We need to install curl into our WSL-2 instance, so type into the command line,

. You may be prompted for a password. It is the same password you created when you first set up WSL-2. You are prompted to use the password because you are using which is “super user permission”. allows us to to download necessary software from outside software library servers.

Next, we want to install Node Version Manager (nvm). NVM is a super helpful tool because it allows you to download and run different versions of npm. In our command line, we need to copy and paste the following command:

and hit Enter. Let’s verify that it was installed correctly by typing . This should return nvm if it was installed correctly. If you get an error or no output, close the Ubuntu terminal down and restart it. It should now return nvm.

We’re all ready to install our first version of node.js! 👍 For this demo, I installed node.js version 14.16.0. In the command line type

and hit enter. This will install this version of node.js and it can be verified by typing for the node.js version and for the npm version. In the event that you need a different version of node.js, the commands will install the new version.

After you have installed a few different versions of node.js depending on the requirements of your projects, you can list the versions using the

command.

To change the version from the list generated by nvm ls, you can type in the command

. In my case I wanted to use node.js version 16.17.0, so I typed in
and verified the node.js version by typing in where it returned v16.17.0.

Installing node.js and npm on Mac iOS

Lucky Mac users! Your Terminal comes pre-loaded with Mac iOS. 😀 After we find the Terminal, we will need to install Homebrew, which is a package installation software for Mac iOS. Once brew is installed, we can install node.js and npm. The directions follow:

Go to Launchpad and type terminal into the search bar. This will bring up the terminal icon. Click on the icon.

Install brew by copy and pasting the command below:

Copy and paste each of these 2 commands separately to set the correct PATH for

. MAKE SURE TO CHANGE YourUsername TO WITHOUT “< or >”.

Verify the installation by typing in brew , then Enter. You should see the menu as below:

Remove existing Node Versions. Even if you have never worked with

before, it is recommended to NOT skip this step. Execute the 2 commands separately below:

Install

brewnvm`:

Important steps to make the directory for

and set its PATH:

• Create the directory for
  nvm
  :

• Set environment variables in the
  .bash_profile
  file:

• Type the letter “i” to allow —INSERT—, then type in the code below on the in the first 2 lines at the top:

• Press ESC + :wq to save and close your file.
• Load the variable to the current shell environment:

``source ~/.bash_profile`

• Verify the installation in the command line with
  nvm
  and it should return the following:

Hang in there! We’re almost done! 👍 😀

Let’s install a few different versions of

and (finally!😅)!

• You can install the latest
  nodejs
  version with:

• In my case, I needed 2 specific versions of
  nodejs
  (also known as
  node
  )
  16.10.0
  and
  14.16.0
  because the dependency versions were needed for my particular projects. I install each separately using the following:

Verify our

versions in :

You did it!! nodejs and npm have been installed with nvm. Woo hoo!! 🎉💥

Installing

node.js

and

npm

with

nvm

on Ubuntu Linux

Installing

on Ubuntu Linux is very easy. If it is a new installation of Ubuntu, we will need to install , then install with . Just in case you were curious, is a command line tool that developers use to transfer data from one server to another, in our case to download . After a few easy steps, you will be up and running! 🏃🏾‍♀️

• Install

  cURL
  if it is not already installed with
  sudo apt install curl
  .

• Download nvm with cURL:

  curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/creationix/nvm/master/install.sh | bash
  

• Rather than log out and log in again to set our environment for

  nvm
  , we can simply set the environment by executing:
  source ~/.bashrc

• Verify your installation with the command

  nvm
  and you should see the output below.

• Install the latest version of

  nodejs
  (also known as just
  node
  ) with
  nvm install node
  .

• Install a specific version of

  node
  with
  nvm install <VERSION>
  .

  

• Install another specific version of

  node
  with
  nvm install <VERSION>
  .

• List all of your installed versions of

  node
  with
  nvm ls
  . In my case there are several that have already been installed.

• Let’s verify the current loaded version with

  node -v
  .

  

• Now we can switch to another installed version using

  nvm use <VERSION>
  .

You made it to the end of our nodejs and npm installation with nvm tutorial!
Congratulations!! 🎉💥🥇