tar-dependency

Installs tar archives defined in package.json to a directory

This is a small helper tool with the following purpose:

• It fetches / extracts .tar(.gz) archives into a local folder
• It stores the installed archive infos in package.json

This tool is mainly used for fetching git repositories as tar archives from github / gitlab: The archives needed during development / as part of the package can be defined in package.json, so this information is part of the main repo and can be distributed to source control. It allows adding non-npm dependencies to be installed as part of the package management.

We created this tool to replace Bower, where packages are not available as npm/yarn packages.

Requirements

This library needs at least NodeJS >= 20

Installation

npm install --save-dev tar-dependency

Usage

Note: This tool assumes a package.json in the current working directory.

Install a TAR archive from a URL

tar-dependency add [tar-url] [relative-install-path]

For example:

tar-dependency add --strip 1 https://github.com/bylexus/php-injector/archive/0.0.8.tar.gz packages/php-injector

This fetches the mentioned tar repo to packages/php-injector, and strips the archive's top directory (default).

The added archive is stored in package.json, in the tarDependencies object.

Install archives from package.json

To install archives configured in package.json, execute

tar-dependency install

This installs the archives configured in package.json into their configured relative dir.

Remove installed archive

tar-dependency remove [relative-path]

e.g.:

tar-dependency remove packages/php-injector

This removes the archive from the disk as well as from package.json

Manually change archive entries in package.json

The installed archives are stored in package.json. You can manually edit the entries, if needed. The structure looks as follows:

{
  "tarDependencies": {
      "[relative-dir]": {
          "url": "<url-to-tar-file>",
          "strip": <nr of archive dirs to strip>
      },
    ...
  }
}

For example:

{
  "tarDependencies": {
      "components/php-injector": {
        "url": "https://github.com/bylexus/php-injector/archive/0.0.8.tar.gz",
        "strip": 1
      },
      "components/components-ext": {
        "url": "https://gitlab.kadenpartner.ch/kp/extjs/repository/4.2.6-min/archive.tgz?private_token=abcdefg",
        "strip": 1
      }
  }
}

and then install them with

tar-dependency install

Changelog

0.2.0 - Feb 2025

• [breaking] Updated to NodeJS >= 20 with ES Modules
• [breaking] You need a NodeJS version that supports ES Modules (~ V.14.0)
• Updated dependant packages

0.1.0

Initial release

(c) 2017-2025 [email protected]