Question

NPM, which was briefly discussed in Chapter 10 , is an online repository of JavaScript modules, many of which are specifically written for Node. When you install Node on your computer, you also get a program called npm , which provides a convenient interface to this repository.

For example, one module you will find on NPM is figlet , which can convert text into ASCII art—drawings made out of text characters. The following transcript shows how to install and use it:

$ npm install figlet
npm GET https://registry.npmjs.org/figlet
npm 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/figlet
npm GET https://registry.npmjs.org/figlet/-/figlet-1.0.9.tgz
npm 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/figlet/-/figlet-1.0.9.tgz
figlet@1.0.9 node_modules/figlet
$ node
> var figlet = require("figlet");
> figlet.text("Hello world!", function(error, data) {
    if (error)
      console.error(error);
    else
      console.log(data);
  });
  _   _      _ _                            _     _ _
 | | | | ___| | | ___   __      _____  _ __| | __| | |
 | |_| |/ _ \ | |/ _ \  \ \ /\ / / _ \| '__| |/ _` | |
 |  _  |  __/ | | (_) |  \ V  V / (_) | |  | | (_| |_|
 |_| |_|\___|_|_|\___/    \_/\_/ \___/|_|  |_|\__,_(_)

After running npm install , NPM will have created a directory called node_modules . Inside that directory will be a figlet directory, which contains the library. When we run node and call require("figlet") , this library is loaded, and we can call its text method to draw some big letters.

Somewhat unexpectedly perhaps, instead of simply returning the string that makes up the big letters, figlet.text takes a callback function that it passes its result to. It also passes the callback another argument, error , which will hold an error object when something goes wrong or null when everything is all right.

This is a common pattern in Node code. Rendering something with figlet requires the library to read a file that contains the letter shapes. Reading that file from disk is an asynchronous operation in Node, so figlet.text can’t immediately return its result. Asynchronicity is infectious, in a way—every function that calls an asynchronous function must itself become asynchronous.

There is much more to NPM than npm install . It reads package.json files, which contain JSON-encoded information about a program or library, such as which other libraries it depends on. Doing npm install in a directory that contains such a file will automatically install all dependencies, as well as their dependencies. The npm tool is also used to publish libraries to NPM’s online repository of packages so that other people can find, download, and use them.

This book won’t delve further into the details of NPM usage. Refer to npmjs.org for further documentation and for an easy way to search for libraries.

This is a book about getting computers to do what you want them to do. Computers are about as common as screwdrivers today, but they contain a lot more hidden complexity and thus are harder to operate and understand. To many, they remain alien, slightly threatening things.