Node.js Installation

As always, we'll start from a Debian template.
We'll refer to this article, stating it's the best way to install Node.js !

We'll first create a dev user that is going to be part of the sudoers group (DigitalOcean reference).

> adduser dev
...
Enter new UNIX password: 
Retype new UNIX password: 
...
> usermod -aG sudo dev

NOTE: the following commands will be executed as dev user.

Check the NVM GitHub repo for the latest version of the script.

> wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/creationix/nvm/v0.33.4/install.sh | bash
=> Downloading nvm as script to '/root/.nvm'

=> Appending nvm source string to /root/.bashrc
=> Appending bash_completion source string to /root/.bashrc
=> Close and reopen your terminal to start using nvm or run the following to use it now:

export NVM_DIR="$HOME/.nvm"
[ -s "$NVM_DIR/nvm.sh" ] && \. "$NVM_DIR/nvm.sh"  # This loads nvm
[ -s "$NVM_DIR/bash_completion" ] && \. "$NVM_DIR/bash_completion"  # This loads nvm bash_completion

In case you'd like to better grasp what the script exactly does, and what files it involves, you can refer to https://github.com/creationix/nvm#manual-install

First you can list the installed Node.js versions:

> nvm list
nvm list
            N/A
node -> stable (-> N/A) (default)
iojs -> N/A (default)

Next you can list the available Node.js versions:

> nvm ls-remote
        v0.1.14
        v0.1.15
        v0.1.16
        v0.1.17
        ...
        ...
         v7.9.0
        v7.10.0
         v8.0.0
         v8.1.0
         v8.1.1
         v8.1.2

The list being very long, it is possible to reduce the output using something like: $ nvm ls-remote | tail -n9 to only display the last 9 versions or $ nvm ls-remote | grep “v7” to only view version 7…

<Code

nvm install 7.10.0

</Code>

When you have many Node.js versions, change the default with:

> nvm use 8.0.0
> nvm alias default 8.0.0

To check the current default version:

> node -v

> npm -v
4.2.0

> npm install -g npm
> npm -v
5.0.3

> echo fs.inotify.max_user_watches=524288 | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf && sudo sysctl -p