npm install error ENOTDIR

Question

I am very new to Node.js and trying to install Flatiron using npm but it gives me an error.

sudo npm install flatiron -g

And I get -

Answer 1

Below are the steps to install a given release from source without root NOTE - this installs nodejs which gives you both node as well as npm, they come together per release.

to start fresh remove prior node.js and npm installs as well as these :

sudo mv ~/.npmrc ~/.npmrc_ignore
sudo mv ~/.npm   ~/.npm_ignore
sudo mv ~/tmp    ~/tmp_ignore
sudo mv ~/.npm-init.js ~/.npm-init.js_ignore

to install nodejs and npm as yourself NOT root do these commands (OSX/linux) :

export NODE_PARENT=${HOME}/bin_0_10_32

mkdir ${NODE_PARENT}

download source from : http://nodejs.org/download/

cd node-v0.xxxx

./configure   --prefix=${NODE_PARENT}/nodejs

make -j8
make install   #  IMPORTANT this is NOT using sudo
               # not wanted since installing into $USER owned $NODE_PARENT

which puts it into dir defined by above --prefix

export PATH=${NODE_PARENT}/nodejs/bin:$PATH

define environment variable NODE_PATH so node can find dir for modules otherwise npm install xxx will put newly installed module into current dir :

export NODE_PATH=${NODE_PARENT}/nodejs/lib/node_modules

when you use syntax : npm install -g some_cool_module the -g for global installs it into dir $NODE_PATH and not your $PWD

nodejs install gives you npm as well :

ls -la ${NODE_PARENT}/nodejs/bin

Subsequent modules you install using global flag -g will automagically put their ~binaries~ into above bin dir ... like browserify

Now put above three export xxx=yyy commands into your ~/.bashrc or some such so your environment is setup