I have a big node repo that has a node_modules folder, which is untracked (included in the .gitignore file).
I recently started learning about git worktrees and I would like to be able to add worktrees that include the node_modules folder without having to run npm install on that worktree. Is there a way to accomplish that without editing .gitignore or copying the folder manually? I just would like to have worktrees ready to go when creating them.
npm workspaces automatically symlink the node_modules directory for all child projects (workspaces) that have a packages.json.
Here is an example project structure
PROJECT /
node_modules
packages /
client /
package.json
server /
package.json
wt-main/
client/
server/
package.json
All of the workspace packages have their own package.json but will share the top-level node_modules.
Run npm install from the root to resolve dependencies for all workspaces. npm install dependencies for specific workspaces with npm install package -w workspace. For example, I can stall foo for my wt-main workspace by doing npm install foo -w packages/wt-main.
package.json "workspaces": [
"packages/*"
]
The above configuration assumes all the worktrees are in packages/. The worktree name cannot be the same as the branch. Hence why the main branch worktree is name wt-main instead of just main.
Create new worktree for main branch
git worktree add packages/wt-main
Switch to the worktree
cd packages/wt-main
Start the NPM project like normal
npm run start (or whatever is used)
There will be a noticeable lack of node_modules anymore in the workspaces / worktrees but the project still works!
Finally, ignore any packages that are actually worktrees. The pattern here is to start worktree directory names with with wt-.
packages/wt-*
Not sure if this is what you mean, but you can temporarily remove node_modules from .gitignore and add that line back after you've pushed the contents upstream.
.gitignore" step, and once you've added and committed the node modules files and pushed them to GitHub, you're stuck with them forever (assuming GitHub is the upstream; GitHub never delete any commits no matter how hard you work on your end).So there's not a way, that I can think of, that accomplishes what you're asking without violating at least one of your prerequisites. You will have to do one of the 3:
npm install within your worktree.node_modules.node_modules within your .gitignore (this would run into the issue of having to remove previously tracked node_modules from git).I would recommend the first (run npm install within your worktree), for the exact reason that @torek stated. There could be slightly different versions of dependencies within your node_modules and unless it matches 1:1 to your package_lock.json within the worktree, you're in for a world of frustration and you'll end up running npm install anyways.
The main use case I have for a worktree is because I am working on a feature branch that has a different set of node_modules (say an angular version upgrade feature branch) and I need to checkout develop or another feature branch for a code review and I don't want to have to run npm install every time I checkout to a new branch.