NPMaybe

Test NPM modules without installing them manually

What

NPMaybe takes care of the temporary nature of testing modules - just feed it the file that you want to run, with unmodified require statements, and NPMaybe will run it with the proper dependencies.

Usage

First, install NPMaybe globally:

$ npm install -g npmaybe

If you have a file called index.js, for example:

var chalk = require('chalk');

console.log(chalk.green('Hello World'));

Run your file with npmaybe:

$ npmaybe index.js

npmaybe will run your file with the required dependencies.

Why

Sometimes when I'm starting a new project, I want to try out a few NPM modules to see which one fits what I'm doing the best. It gets tedious to npm install them, run my code, then npm uninstall the unwanted ones. Usually I just forget to uninstall them...

How

First, NPMaybe takes a look at which dependencies you need using required. Then, NPMaybe installs those dependencies in a temporary directory on your OS. If you specify, these dependencies can be removed as soon as your script finishes, otherwise they will be deleted when you reboot.

To use the dependencies, NPMaybe substitutes the require references with the location the temporary dependencies, creating a new file in the same directory. Lastly, NPMaybe spawns your script as a child process.