NAME¶
npm-cache - Manipulates packages cache
SYNOPSIS¶
npm cache add <tarball file>
npm cache add <folder>
npm cache add <tarball url>
npm cache add <name>@<version>
npm cache clean [<path>]
aliases: npm cache clear, npm cache rm
npm cache verify
DESCRIPTION¶
Used to add, list, or clean the npm cache folder.
- •
- add: Add the specified package to the local cache. This command is
primarily intended to be used internally by npm, but it can provide a way
to add data to the local installation cache explicitly.
- •
- clean: Delete all data out of the cache folder.
- •
- verify: Verify the contents of the cache folder, garbage collecting any
unneeded data, and verifying the integrity of the cache index and all
cached data.
DETAILS¶
npm stores cache data in an opaque directory within the configured
cache,
named
_cacache. This directory is a
cacache-based
content-addressable cache that stores all http request data as well as other
package-related data. This directory is primarily accessed through
pacote, the library responsible for all package fetching as of npm@5.
All data that passes through the cache is fully verified for integrity on both
insertion and extraction. Cache corruption will either trigger an error, or
signal to
pacote that the data must be refetched, which it will do
automatically. For this reason, it should never be necessary to clear the
cache for any reason other than reclaiming disk space, thus why
clean
now requires
--force to run.
There is currently no method exposed through npm to inspect or directly manage
the contents of this cache. In order to access it,
cacache must be used
directly.
npm will not remove data by itself: the cache will grow as new packages are
installed.
A NOTE ABOUT THE CACHE'S DESIGN¶
The npm cache is strictly a cache: it should not be relied upon as a persistent
and reliable data store for package data. npm makes no guarantee that a
previously-cached piece of data will be available later, and will
automatically delete corrupted contents. The primary guarantee that the cache
makes is that, if it does return data, that data will be exactly the data that
was inserted.
To run an offline verification of existing cache contents, use
npm cache
verify.
CONFIGURATION¶
cache¶
Default:
~/.npm on Posix, or
%AppData%/npm-cache on Windows.
The root cache folder.
SEE ALSO¶
