--- title: "Yeoman generators, the file system and symlinks." date: 2018-07-21T18:00:00-04:00 author: John Morton canonical_url: "https://supergeekery.com/blog/yeoman-generator-locations" section: Blog --- # Yeoman generators, the file system and symlinks. *July 21, 2018* by John Morton ![Npm Updated Version Using Symlink Feature](https://static.supergeekery.com/site-assets/npm-updated-version-using-symlink-feature-image.png) I write and maintain a [Yeoman](http://yeoman.io/ "Yeoman: Kickstart new projects, prescribing best practices and tools to help you stay productive") generator called "[Build A Banner](https://www.npmjs.com/package/generator-buildabanner "NPM: Build A Banner")", aka _BAB_. As you might guess from the title, the generator helps in developing animated display ad banners. It creates a directory with customized HTML, JS and CSS starter files, builds a small development server with live-reloading, and has workflows for optimizing and delivering banners to a media company. We use it all the time at JMX2. Although I've been maintaining this repo for years, I have just recently decided to pay attention to how my _local_ generator (i.e. my work in progress version of _BAB_) and the _global_ generators I've also got installed exist within my file system. ## A quick primer Before I dive in, let's talk about Yeoman quickly. Yeoman is a node package that helps scaffold out projects. What kind of projects? Well, in the case of _BAB_, the project is building an advertising banner. Another project I scaffold out regularly is building a plugin for Craft CMS. A friend of mine maintains a generator for it called "generator-craftplugin" and it does that exactly. There are all kinds of generators and you can find them at the [Yeoman Generator Discover page](http://yeoman.io/generators/). ## Global node modules Let's assume you've read the instructions on how to install Yeoman. How do you install generators? Generators are node modules, so you install a generator just like you'd install any node module. Typically you install them globally from the command line like this. (I say "typically" because Yeoman has a built in _install a generator_ feature as well. I don't use this though.) To install the current public version of _BAB_ **globally**, you'd use this command on your command line: ``` npm install -g generator-buildabanner ``` To install the current public version of _generator-craftplugin_ **globally**, you'd use this command on your command line: ``` npm install -g generator-craftplugin ``` The `-g` is the flag telling npm to install globally. ## Local node modules If the `-g` flags wasn't there, you'd be installing it in a `node_modules` subfolder of the directory you're currently in while in your Terminal. Your module wouldn't be globally available though, and we need our Yeoman generators to be available anywhere on our computers since we will scaffold out projects in many locations. You will probably not want everything to be global though. For example, if you wanted the [Flickity](https://flickity.metafizzy.co/ "Flickity: Touch responsive carousels") javascript library installed into your web dev project, you'd want that library to be in your local directory. You'd run the following, with a `--save` flag, so you can keep track of it in a package.json file. ``` npm install flickity --save ``` You'd see a `node_modules` directory created (if it wasn't there already) and the Flickity files would be inside of it. ## Where Yeoman generators live Let's get back to Yeoman now. Now that those global Yeoman generators are installed, you might wonder where they exist on your local file system. They are global node modules so they'll be installed alongside your other global node modules. Ok, where is *that*? Well, follow me down the rabbit hole. There are several ways to install Node. The normal way you would install it would be to follow the instructions on the [Node JS site](https://nodejs.org/en/ "Node JS Homepage"). Why would you *not* follow those instructions? There are many versions of Node. Node is also updated regularly. Sometimes you need a version of Node that is different from the current stable version. There is a script called [_Node Version Manager_](https://github.com/creationix/nvm "Node Version Manager on Github"), aka NVM, that helps you install multiple different versions of Node and easily switch between them as you need to. That's how I've got Node installed. If you've followed the official Node directions, your modules are probably installed in either `/usr/local/lib/node` or `/usr/local/lib/node_modules`. If you're using NVM like I am, your modules are installed somewhere like this: ``` /Users/john/.nvm/versions/node/v10.5.0/lib/node_modules ``` That path shows you that I've got Node 10.5.0 installed and have a node_modules director for that installation of Node. ![Node Modules Location Global](https://static.supergeekery.com/site-assets/node_modules-locations-global.png) *`/Users/john/.nvm/versions/node/v10.5.0/lib/node_modules` with global node modules* ### Check your generators and their version number. In my case, you can see I've got _BAB_ installed. I find I need to check the version of the generators I have installed regularly. The following rather obscure command is how you do that. I have it saved as a text snippet on my machine since I can't remember it easily. ``` npm ls -g --depth=1 2>/dev/null | grep generator- ``` Here's what that shows for me. ![Node Generator Installed Versions](https://static.supergeekery.com/site-assets/node-generator-installed-versions.png) I've got version 0.10.4 installed. That's the old version of _BAB_ and I want my version in development on my local machine to be shown instead. ## Using a local generator globally So far, so good. Here's where it might get a little tricky. It's not too bad though. For my _BAB_ project, I want it available globally, but I need it somewhere else on my file system so I can work on updating it regularly. I keep it here: ``` ~/git/generator-buildabanner ``` I go to that directory using a terminal program and link that directory using NPM. (Note: Be warned if you're playing along here before getting to the end. This will _remove_ your globally installed version entirely. You will need to re-install after you're done.) ``` npm link ``` ![Npm Link Example](https://static.supergeekery.com/site-assets/npm-link-example.png) *A symbolic link from the local git to the global node_modules location is created.* Now let's check the version of the installed generators again. ![Npm Updated Version Using Symlink](https://static.supergeekery.com/site-assets/npm-updated-version-using-symlink.png) *Version 2.0.0 of the Build A Banner Yeoman generator is installed.* Notice the screenshot above. The generator version number is followed by an arrow indicating that it's pointing to a location to somewhere on the local machine other. If I navigate to the global node_modules directory, I'd see the previous version of `generator-buildabanner` has been replaced by a symlink. In the Mac Finder it looks like an alias link. The small arrow on the folder indicates it's actually pointing to a different location on your file system, but Node will still use it. ![Node Modules Location With Local](https://static.supergeekery.com/site-assets/node_modules-locations-local.png) *Notice the small arrow indicating a symlink.* ## Removing a symlink If you need to get rid of that symlink, there's an easy to do it. Navigate back to the location of your locally built project. In my case, that's `~/git/generator-buildabanner`. Enter this `unlink` command. ``` npm unlink ``` Poof. The symlink is gone. The original version of the generator is also gone now. The link command overwrote it with the local copy. If you need to reinstall it globally in the normal way you'd install a global node module. ``` npm install -g generator-buildabanner ``` --- **Tags:** yeoman, node, npm