CODEWITHSUNDEEP
node.jssudowindows-subsystem-for-linuxoh-my-zshnvm
jmpp
jmpp

Reputation: 366

sudo: npm: command not found in WSL

I'm trying to install globally some packages for my Unix environment on Windows with WSL. I use nvm to manage the different versions of Node.js.

The problem is while using the sudo command before a global npm install :

sudo npm install --global prompt-pure

I get an error: sudo: npm: command not found !

WSL sudo node npm command not found

Doing a simple npm install --global pure-prompt will work, but as I'm not super user, the global installation ends up with a permission error.

How can I fix this annoying problem and keep nvm ?

Thanks by advance

Upvotes: 5

Views: 10540

Answers (3)

user14219984
user14219984

Reputation: 126

When you try to run sudo npm, it tries to run the npm binary file /usr/bin/npm but your binary is located in a different place, which can be found running which npm.

Example: /home/damo/.nvm/versions/node/v8.11.1/bin/npm

The solution is to create a link in /usr/bin/ pointing to the actual binary:

sudo ln -s "$(which npm)" /usr/bin/npm

You can also add the following link so you can run sudo node

sudo ln -s "$(which node)" /usr/bin/node

Upvotes: 9

Morgan O'Neal
Morgan O'Neal

Reputation: 1118

For me I needed to actually cheat and run as root before installing node as root. For this I ran sudo su in a Ubuntu WSL term and then installed node.

Once I did that I could sudo su then npm run special-script.

I don't know a better way to get a script to attach to restricted ports like 443 for testing https connections but it works.

Upvotes: 1

Damo
Damo

Reputation: 6443

As you will find in the man file for sudo man sudo sudo will execute a command as another user. That other user has a different home directory to you and access to different commands

When i run sudo which node i get nothing, but which node returns /home/damo/.nvm/versions/node/v8.11.1/bin/node

Lets look at your actual goal. You say you are trying to install pure-prompt, i know this does not ask your explicit question but given you have zsh installed have you tried oh-my-zsh (https://github.com/robbyrussell/oh-my-zsh) i use this on every install of linux i ever have to work with (VMs, WSL, docker). Very customizable and looks great out of the box.

Upvotes: 0

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