NVM & Node.js - Recommended install for all users

Question

is there a recommended install for nvm so all users can use it? i cannot find anything on the web regarding this.

this is what i did

• installed nvm in a common directory
• put the nvm.sh script locationin .profile for all users
• created a nvm/alias directory (nvm complains if this is not here for other users)

then each user must either run "nvm use " or put it in their profile by default

not sure if there is a better way?

thanks

Answer 1

Here is what I did:

1. Installed nvm in /opt/nvm as root. Seemed like an appropriate location.

   # git clone git@github.com:creationix/nvm.git /opt/nvm
   

2. Created the directory /usr/local/nvm. This is where the downloads will go ($NVM_DIR)

   # mkdir /usr/local/nvm
   

3. Create the directory /usr/local/node. This is where the NPM global stuff will go:

   # mkdir /usr/local/node
   

4. Created a file called nvm.sh in /etc/profile.d with the following contents:

   export NVM_DIR=/usr/local/nvm
   source /opt/nvm/nvm.sh
   
   export NPM_CONFIG_PREFIX=/usr/local/node
   export PATH="/usr/local/node/bin:$PATH"
   

5. Re-login to a shell session, then set the default node version.

   # nvm install 0.10
   # nvm alias default 0.10
   

The node binaries should now be in the PATH for all users the next time you login to a shell session. NPM will install global things to the /usr/local/node prefix.

Answer 2

It's best to install one copy of node globally so that other users can access it. To do this, run the following command (entering your user's password at the prompt):

n=$(which node);n=${n%/bin/node}; chmod -R 755 $n/bin/*; sudo cp -r $n/{bin,lib,share} /usr/local

This commend is copying whatever version of node you have active via nvm into the /usr/local/ directory and setting the permissions so that all users can access them.

To check that it works, become the root user and do another which command to make sure that node is now installed to /usr/local/bin:

sudo -s
which node

If you ever want to change the version of node that's installed system wide, just do another nvm use vXX.XX.XX to switch your user's node to the version you want, and then re-run the first command above to copy it to the system directory.

Answer 3

1. Login as root: sudo -s

2. Create destination folder: mkdir /usr/local/nvm

3. Install nvm: curl -o- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/creationix/nvm/v0.33.1/install.sh | NVM_DIR=/usr/local/nvm bash

4. Create a file called nvm.sh in /etc/profile.d with the following contents:

   #!/usr/bin/env bash
   export NVM_DIR="/usr/local/nvm"
   [ -s "$NVM_DIR/nvm.sh" ] && \. "$NVM_DIR/nvm.sh"  # This loads nvm
   

5. Set permissions chmod 755 /etc/profile.d/nvm.sh

6. Run /etc/profile.d/nvm.sh

7. Install node: nvm install node

8. Optionally update npm with: npm install -g npm

Answer 4

Install NVM on your Linux server, after that install node version using NVM (run all the command as root user). After that run the below command for all the users get nodejs available with nvm

n=$(which node);n=${n%/bin/node}; chmod -R 755 $n/bin/*; sudo cp -r $n/{bin,lib,share} /usr/local

The above command is a bit complicated, but all it’s doing is copying whatever version of node you have active via nvm into the /usr/local/ directory (where user installed global files should live on a linux VPS/server) and setting the permissions so that all users can access them.

/root/.nvm/versions/node/v8.10.0/bin/node

Switch the user name check your node version.

su - username
which node
/usr/local/bin/node

Answer 5

Since LJHarb recommends not installing this globally, I decided to create a script to install nvm when you login to the server. I needed this as I had several users setup that may login, but needed access to pm2 (to monitor one of our applications).

Create the script in /etc/profile.d/ (named nvm.sh for example):

#!/bin/bash
NODE_VER=6.2.2
if [ ! -f ~/.nvm/nvm.sh ]; then
    # May need to be updated with the latest nvm release
    wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/creationix/nvm/v0.32.0/install.sh | bash
fi
source ~/.nvm/nvm.sh
if ! command -v node | grep -q $NODE_VER; then
    echo "Node is not installed"
    nvm install $NODE_VER
    nvm alias default $NODE_VER
fi

For our application, we needed pm2 shared between users:

if ! command -v pm2 &>/dev/null; then
    echo "pm2 not installed"
    npm install -g pm2
fi
# Share pm2 configuration between users
alias pm2='env HOME=/opt/sora pm2'

Answer 6

I had a small VPS with two users, wanted to avoid installing multiple copies of node due to limited space

Simply moved $HOME/.nvm of user that had NVM to /opt/nvm and chmod -R 777 /opt/nvm so writable by all users

Then set each user's NVM_HOME in .bashrc to /opt/nvm

Seemed like most obvious solution to me, since one user had a pre-existing .nvm folder

Re: ugly permissions, this copy will only be used for development purposes - I would def recommend anyone using node in production not consider this method

Answer 7

I found a cleaner way, and this way you can probably have multiple versions with tweaks, I haven't tried it.

Login to your root account and follow these steps.

1. install nvm
2. install node with it, eg:

nvm install 14

3. run

n=$(which node);
n=${n%/bin/node};cd $n;cd ..;
ls

4. pick a version and run it in :

node_v=the_version_you_picked

5. run

mv $node_v /usr/local/node/$node_v;cd /usr/local/node/$node_v;chmod -R 755 ./

echo "PATH=\${PATH}:/usr/local/node/$node_v/bin;export PATH" > /etc/profile.d/gloabl_node.sh

and exit and re-login, now run which node or node -v to confirm it's working.

Now you can rename the bin files and all the other configs it needs to run multiple versions. eg: rename node -> node-14 and so on.