How to Install Node.js for Ubuntu 20.04 LTS? | Hacker News Reader

How to Install Node.js for Ubuntu 20.04 LTS?

iroleh.me

12 pointsiroleh11 comments

Replace '10' if you want another version:

curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_10.x | sudo -E bash -

sudo apt-get install -y nodejs

Better to point people at the official instructions, to give them context about the thing you suggest them to sudocurl: https://github.com/nodesource/distributions#debinstall .

Installation nit aside, nodesource is my preferred way to upgrade node on Debian/Ubuntu:

1. It's "just a newer version" of the OS-packaged version! As simple/vanilla as can be.

2. No shell magic making it unclear whether programs running out of the shell will pick up your nvm-managed version of node (most of the time, they won't)

3. And if someday I need to try something on $OLDNODE, it's not much less convenient than nvm: I can just download the deb for $OLDNODE and install it anytime. Then, if you configure your apt cache to keep .debs in /var/cache/apt, switching between versions like nvm does is a matter of just running `sudo dpkg -i /var/cache/apt/node-whatever.deb`. (Sure, it's a bit slower than nvm: a few seconds of install rather than milliseconds of updating a symlink in nvm; still I prefer it for reasons 1. and 2.)

Can I still just install NVM and use that to install and maintain Node? I assume snap will suffer the same annoyances of apt where I can't trivially get the exact version I want and switch among them.

Yes. That’s what I did. I’m an ops engineer supporting multiple dev teams who are on varying versions of Node, nvm is all I can use.

If you don’t like NVM’s shell config shenanigans you can use n - https://github.com/tj/n

There'a also `nodenv` which I've taken to using recently. Doesn't slow down opening new shells like nvm. And has a handy feature that will set the used node version to whatever is found in a directory's `.node-version` file.

You can also just wrap the nvm commands in a function. I have it named `n`, so before doing any node/npm stuff in a shell, I run `n` then `node ....` whatever I wanted. Simple and doesn't slow down opening new shells.

    function n() {
      export NVM_DIR="$HOME/.nvm"
      [ -s "$NVM_DIR/nvm.sh" ] && \. "$NVM_DIR/nvm.sh"
      [ -s "$NVM_DIR/bash_completion" ] && \. "$NVM_DIR/bash_completion"
    }

Found it to be a ok workaround for the issue. Otherwise I'm just on nvm just because it continues to work and hasn't gotten in my way, since like 2013 or something. If someone is in the same boat but wanna fix the "slow new shell" thing, this is a quick fix for it.

Would love to hear what the "shell config shenanigans" wayneftw talked about, haven't hit that myself.

And `pyenv` [1], for Python.

I came into `nodenv` after being a regular user of `pyenv` for a while. Started with `nvm`, but wished for something more pyenv-like.

There is also `asdf` [2], which seems even more generic. On paper it looks interesting, but I haven't found a solid reason to switch out of `pyenv` and `nodenv`.

Has anyone tried `pyenv` and/or `nodenv` and switched to `asdf`?

[1] https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv [2] https://github.com/asdf-vm/asdf

Is it possible to install multiple versions of node with snap, for multiple projects of (possibly) multiple customers? That was not possible with apt. I've been using nvm or asdf for ages because of that. Not only for node but also for ruby (rvm or asdf), elixir (asdf), python (pyenv), php (asdf) and probably something I'm forgetting about. I used docker for that sometimes but mainly for databases (multiple PostgreSQLs and MySQLs.)

Note: Node 14 was released last week. You might want to use that rather than 13, as unlike 13 it will become an LTS supported release.

I always do it like this:

sudo sh -c 'wget -qO- distro.tools/install/node | sh'

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