How to install and run Typescript locally in npm?

I want to install and run Typescript (i.e. no global dependencies).

Here is my package.json file:

{
  "name": "foo",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "description": "",
  "main": "index.js",
  "scripts": {
    "test": "echo \"Error: no test specified\" && exit 1",
    "tsc": "tsc"
  },
  "devDependencies": {
    "typescript": "^1.8.10"
  },
  "author": "",
  "license": "ISC"
}

I then run:

npm install
npm run tsc

However when I run the second command I get sooo many errors it cannot display all it. Most of it is like the following:

../foo/node_modules/typescript/lib/lib.d.ts(5015,5): error TS2300: Duplicate identifier 'webkitTransformOrigin'.
../foo/node_modules/typescript/lib/lib.d.ts(5016,5): error TS2300: Duplicate identifier 'webkitTransformStyle'.
../foo/node_modules/typescript/lib/lib.d.ts(5017,5): error TS2300: Duplicate identifier 'webkitTransition'.
../foo/node_modules/typescript/lib/lib.d.ts(5018,5): error TS2300: Duplicate identifier 'webkitTransitionDelay'.
../foo/node_modules/typescript/lib/lib.d.ts(5019,5): error TS2300: Duplicate identifier 'webkitTransitionDuration'.
../foo/node_modules/typescript/lib/lib.d.ts(5020,5): error TS2300: Duplicate identifier 'webkitTransitionProperty'.

In npm-debug.log I get:

0 info it worked if it ends with ok
1 verbose cli [ '/usr/bin/nodejs', '/usr/bin/npm', 'run', 'tsc' ]
2 info using [email protected]
3 info using [email protected]
4 verbose run-script [ 'pretsc', 'tsc', 'posttsc' ]
5 info lifecycle [email protected]~pretsc: [email protected]
6 silly lifecycle [email protected]~pretsc: no script for pretsc, continuing
7 info lifecycle [email protected]~tsc: [email protected]
8 verbose lifecycle [email protected]~tsc: unsafe-perm in lifecycle true
9 verbose lifecycle [email protected]~tsc: PATH: /usr/lib/node_modules/npm/bin/node-gyp-bin:/home/vagrant/foo/node_modules/.bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games:/usr/local/games
10 verbose lifecycle [email protected]~tsc: CWD: /home/vagrant/foo
11 silly lifecycle [email protected]~tsc: Args: [ '-c', 'tsc' ]
12 silly lifecycle [email protected]~tsc: Returned: code: 2  signal: null
13 info lifecycle [email protected]~tsc: Failed to exec tsc script
14 verbose stack Error: [email protected] tsc: `tsc`
14 verbose stack Exit status 2
14 verbose stack     at EventEmitter.<anonymous> (/usr/lib/node_modules/npm/lib/utils/lifecycle.js:242:16)
14 verbose stack     at emitTwo (events.js:100:13)
14 verbose stack     at EventEmitter.emit (events.js:185:7)
14 verbose stack     at ChildProcess.<anonymous> (/usr/lib/node_modules/npm/lib/utils/spawn.js:40:14)
14 verbose stack     at emitTwo (events.js:100:13)
14 verbose stack     at ChildProcess.emit (events.js:185:7)
14 verbose stack     at maybeClose (internal/child_process.js:850:16)
14 verbose stack     at Process.ChildProcess._handle.onexit (internal/child_process.js:215:5)
15 verbose pkgid [email protected]
16 verbose cwd /home/vagrant/foo
17 error Linux 3.13.0-88-generic
18 error argv "/usr/bin/nodejs" "/usr/bin/npm" "run" "tsc"
19 error node v5.12.0
20 error npm  v3.10.2
21 error code ELIFECYCLE
22 error [email protected] tsc: `tsc`
22 error Exit status 2
23 error Failed at the [email protected] tsc script 'tsc'.
23 error Make sure you have the latest version of node.js and npm installed.
23 error If you do, this is most likely a problem with the foo package,
23 error not with npm itself.
23 error Tell the author that this fails on your system:
23 error     tsc
23 error You can get information on how to open an issue for this project with:
23 error     npm bugs foo
23 error Or if that isn't available, you can get their info via:
23 error     npm owner ls foo
23 error There is likely additional logging output above.
24 verbose exit [ 1, true ]

Note that removing the package and then installing typescript globally solves the problem. However if I then use npm install to install the local packages again, it reintroduces the problem.

Solution 1:

It took me a while to figure out the solution to this problem - it's in the original question. You need to have a script that calls tsc in your package.json file so that you can run:

npm run tsc 

Include -- before you pass in options (or just include them in the script):

npm run tsc -- -v

Here's an example package.json:

{
  "name": "foo",
  "scripts": {
    "tsc": "tsc"
  },
  "dependencies": {
    "typescript": "^1.8.10"
  }
}

Solution 2:

As of npm 5.2.0, once you've installed locally via

npm i typescript --save-dev

...you no longer need an entry in the scripts section of package.json -- you can now run the compiler with npx:

npx tsc

Now you don't have to update your package.json file every time you want to compile with different arguments.

Solution 3:

To install TypeScript local in project as a development dependency you can use --save-dev key

npm install --save-dev typescript

It's also writes the typescript into your package.json

You also need to have a tsconfig.json file. For example

{
  "compilerOptions": {
    "target": "ES5",
    "module": "system",
    "moduleResolution": "node",
    "sourceMap": true,
    "emitDecoratorMetadata": true,
    "experimentalDecorators": true,
    "removeComments": false,
    "noImplicitAny": false
  },
  "exclude": [
    "node_modules",
    ".npm"
  ]
}

For more information about the tsconfig you can see here http://www.typescriptlang.org/docs/handbook/tsconfig-json.html

Solution 4:

You need to tell npm that "tsc" exists as a local project package (via the "scripts" property in your package.json) and then run it via npm run tsc. To do that (at least on Mac) I had to add the path for the actual compiler within the package, like this

{
  "name": "foo"
  "scripts": {
    "tsc": "./node_modules/typescript/bin/tsc"
  },
  "dependencies": {
    "typescript": "^2.3.3",
    "typings": "^2.1.1"
  }
}

After that you can run any TypeScript command like npm run tsc -- --init (the arguments come after the first --).