Better "module not found" message

[gaearon]

This is what I see when I forget to install some npm dependencies:

This is overwhelming and unnecessary.
We should have simple messages, like:

These dependencies were not found in node_modules:

  * redux
  * react-redux

Did you forget to run npm install --save for them?

I’m not sure what to do with local file missing errors (i.e. when you import a non-existing file in src). We should probably group them separately but also in a less intimidating way.

I don’t personally plan to work on this so any help is welcome!

[gaearon]

If you plan to work on this please leave a comment. We don’t want many people to work on the same thing at the same time.

A good place to start looking at would be scripts/start.js. We already handle Webpack errors in an unorthodox way so we may want to keep refining that.

cc @geowarin who also was looking into improvements to webpack output in geowarin/tarec#16.

[rogeliog]

@gaearon I would love to work on this one 😄

[geowarin]

Hi @gaearon.

If you change this line to var json = stats.toJson({}, true);, you'll get a much shorter error output.
It is what webpack normally displays on errors (ie, when you don't parse the errors yourself) and it doesn't include the details field.
See here.

This is a short term measure before somebody actually dives into webpack internals to do exactly what you suggested.
(I'm working on geowarin/tarec#16 and as promised I will contribute back when it's ready but if somebody wants to tackle it in the meantine, it would be interesting)

[jnsdls]

this would be a great change not just for this specific project but in general (at least as an option)

[rogeliog]

Seems that @geowarin already has a PR 👍, he also has more domain knowledge than me!

[geowarin]

I created the friendly-errors-webpack-plugin.

It still needs more work (see the TODO in the README) but I'd love to see your feedback/ PR. 😄
ETA: Friday night

[rogeliog]

@geowarin Awesome, given that you created friendly-errors-webpack-plugin I thought that it would make more sense me to PR that repo instead of this one. geowarin/friendly-errors-webpack-plugin#1

[rogeliog]

@geowarin is there an update on this? I'm more than happy to pick it up or help out with anything :)

[fson]

What if instead of

Did you forget to run npm install --save for them?

missing packages would bring out a prompt to install them for you?

Would you like to install the missing packages? [Y/n]

[geowarin]

Update: there is a PR implementing this.

@fson It would be great to provide autofixes! The only part I'm not sure about is how to allow simple interactions with the console since it is cleared every now and then.

[gaearon]

I’m a bit worried about autofixes because it’s easier to miss typos and install something you didn’t want. I’d like installation act to be explicit.

[mareksuscak]

@gaearon As per Heroku's Node.js best practices we could mitigate the issue by providing .npmrc in the project root folder for newly created projects with essential defaults. We've been using that technique for quite a while now and it's certainly lowered the number of those "forgotten to --save the dependency" issues. If interested I could work on that part.

This is what we use:

save=true
save-exact=true

[fson]

@mareksuscak Thanks for the tip, didn't know about this setting before. However, I think it could increase the confusion in some cases, because we would basically be creating a hidden file that makes npm behave differently from the default. People might not notice it or understand what it does, only npm would seem to behave differently from time to time. That's why I think a simple message showing how to use npm install --save, as suggested originally, would be a better option.

This project also aims to avoid adding configuration and flags as much as possible, so generating a .npmrc file would not fit well in this philosophy.

[gaearon]

I think this was fixed.