npmrcd

Automagically switch between private and public npm registries.

You get a nice notification when the registry switch occurs ⏰

About

Since I frequently change between working from home, on the road, and the office I wanted to make sure I was using the private registry when connected to our corporate networks.

This is daemon that watches for, and automatically switch between private/work and public/default npm registries based on the availability of the private registry.

If the private registry can be resolved via DNS this daemon will switch your .npmrc file using the npmrc in the background. This is a basic detection mechanism, and could be modified to have more complex triggers if necessary.

Requirements

• Node.js 10+
• npm 6+
• macOS (PRs adding Linux daemon setups are very welcome)

Install

npm install -g npmrcd

Setup

Run the setup command after installing. The registry parameter is required.

# Install and setup the daemon with a cafile for the registry
npmrcd setup \
 --cafile="https://certs.acme.com/ACME-Root-CA.crt" \
 --registry="https://eng.acme.com/nexus/repository/registry.npmjs.org"

Daemon Setup Options

The cafile parameter is optional and only required if access to the given registry requires a CA Certificate file.

A triggerssid parameter is also supported to specify WiFi networks where the daemon should switch to the private registry even if it's not accessible. This is useful if the registry should be used in conjunction with a VPN on specific networks.

For example, the following setup would switch to the eng.acme.com registry if the address can be resolved using DNS or the machine is connected to one of the listed SSIDs.

npmrcd setup \
 --triggerssid="Acme Guest Wifi" \
 --triggerssid="Acme Customer Wifi" \
 --cafile="https://certs.acme.com/ACME-Root-CA.crt" \
 --registry="https://eng.acme.com/nexus/repository/registry.npmjs.org"

The registry and cafile options are explained in detail in the npm-config docs.

Uninstall

# Remove the daemon
npmrcd remove
npm uninstall -g npmrcd

Daemon Logs

macOS & Linux

• Logs are stored in /tmp/npmrcd.stdout and /tmp/npmrcd.stderr.
• Configuration files are stored in ~/.npmrcd and ~/.npmrcs.