env-sync-cli-tool

⚡ Automatically generate and sync your .env.example from your .env files in Node.js projects, with watch mode support.

🚀 Features

✅ Generates .env.example from .env by stripping values (keeping keys and comments)
✅ Automatically syncs on .env changes with --watch flag
✅ Prevents missing environment variables in teams and CI
✅ Simple CLI for local and CI workflows

📦 Installation

Using npm:

npm install env-sync-cli-tool

Or globally:

npm install -g env-sync-cli-tool

⚙️ Usage

Ensure your .env file exists in your project root.

Generate .env.example once

Using npx:

npx envsync

Using globally:

envsync

This will generate or update .env.example in your project.

Watch mode

Automatically regenerate .env.example whenever .env changes:

npx envsync --watch

or

envsync --watch

Press Ctrl + C to stop the watcher when done.

Add to your project scripts To automate, add to your package.json:

"scripts": {
  "sync-env": "envsync",
  "sync-env:watch": "envsync --watch"
}

Now you can run:

npm run sync-env

or

npm run sync-env:watch

for continuous syncing during development.

👥 Recommended Workflow

✅ Commit your .env.example to your repository (never your .env). ✅ Team members can copy it when setting up locally:

cp .env.example .env

✅ Run npx envsync after updating .env to keep .env.example current.

📸 Example

Given .env:

# Database configuration
DB_HOST=localhost
DB_USER=root
DB_PASS=password123

Generated .env.example:

# Database configuration
DB_HOST=
DB_USER=
DB_PASS=

🤝 Contributing

PRs and issues are welcome to improve the tool or add new features.

✨ Author

Built with ❤️ by Codehouze