n (node version manager) not working after install - "bash: n: command not found"

Question

I would like to manage node.js versions using the n - node version manager.

I attempted to install n by following the Github docs https://github.com/tj/n and input the following in my terminal:

sudo npm install -g n

After entering my password my terminal returns:

/usr/local/lib/node_modules/node/bin/n -> /usr/local/lib/node_modules/node/lib/node_modules/n/bin/n
+ [email protected]

However, after installing n my terminal doesn't recognize the relevant commands and instead states:

bash: n: command not found

My current node version installed is v12.3.0, while my npm is version 6.9.0.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Lamar

For npm installed "'commands" to be found, the npm bin folder is added to your PATH environment variable. However, your install location looks deeper than expected so I think you have a setup issue first. What does npm prefix -g show? What OS are you on? What does command -v npm show? – Marsh

Answer 1

The commands added using npm global packages are found by the the install location appearing in your PATH environment variable. You appear to have a misconfigured prefix, perhaps due to how node and npm are installed.

This is how things look in a typical setup. The bin folder under the npm prefix is included in PATH so the installed commands are found.

$ npm prefix --global
/usr/local
$ sudo npm install -g n
/usr/local/bin/n -> /usr/local/lib/node_modules/n/bin/n
+ [email protected]
$ echo $PATH
/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin
$ command -v n
/usr/local/bin/n
$ n --version
6.0.1

Marsh

Useful, thanks. I fixed my issue by updating ~/.npmrc to read "prefix=/usr/local" as mentioned above – Phrensy