[BUG] NPM crashes when no access to cache directory, but has access to registry.

[lluio]

Is there an existing issue for this?

• I have searched the existing issues

This issue exists in the latest npm version

• I am using the latest npm

Current Behavior

This previous issue (#4996, fixed by #5197) is still relevant. If the npm cache directory is invalid (e.g. /dummy), but npm does not have access to the registry (behind proxy, or npm_config_offline=true), the ENOENT error is logged, but the app does not crash. If npm does have access to registry, it logs the error and then crashes.

I am, additionally, curious why npm is connecting to the registry at all just because the default cache dir is restricted. I.e:

• With a valid directory, no http-request is logged with NODE_DEBUG=http
• With an illegal directory (e.g. /dummy) the node debug logs show that a GET request is being sent to registry.npmjs.org

Expected Behavior

NPM should not crash with an invalid cache-location just because it has access to the registry. This should, like in #5197, be logged silently as an error and not cause the program to crash.

Steps To Reproduce

1. Using npm@9.6.1 and node@v18.15.0
2. Run a basic npm script, such as this:

{
  "scripts": {
    "dummy": "echo 'hello' && sleep 2 && echo 'Yeet!'"
  }
}

3. With access to registry.npmjs.org, run this command:

npm_config_cache=/123 npm run dummy --loglevel=silly

5. This error is logged:

npm verb cli /home/.../.nvm/versions/node/v18.15.0/bin/node /home/.../.nvm/versions/node/v18.15.0/bin/npm
npm info using npm@9.6.1
npm info using node@v18.15.0
npm verb cache could not create cache: Error: EACCES: permission denied, mkdir '/123'
npm verb logfile could not create logs-dir: Error: EACCES: permission denied, mkdir '/123'
npm verb title npm run dummy
npm verb argv "run" "dummy" "--loglevel" "silly"
npm verb logfile logs-max:10 dir:/123/_logs/2023-03-13T12_57_20_721Z-
npm verb logfile could not be created: Error: ENOENT: no such file or directory, open '/123/_logs/2023-03-13T12_57_20_721Z-debug-0.log'
npm verb logfile no logfile created
npm sill logfile done cleaning log files

> dummy
> echo 'hello' && sleep 2 && echo 'Yeet!'

hello
npm verb stack Error: EACCES: permission denied, mkdir '/123'
npm verb cwd /home/.../temp
npm verb Linux 5.19.0-35-generic
npm verb node v18.15.0
npm verb npm  v9.6.1
npm ERR! code EACCES
npm ERR! syscall mkdir
npm ERR! path /123
npm ERR! errno -13
npm verb Error: EACCES: permission denied, mkdir '/123' 
npm ERR! 
npm ERR! Your cache folder contains root-owned files, due to a bug in
npm ERR! previous versions of npm which has since been addressed.
npm ERR! 
npm ERR! To permanently fix this problem, please run:
npm ERR!   sudo chown -R 1000:1000 "/123"
npm verb exit -13
npm verb unfinished npm timer command:run 1678712240740
npm verb code -13

npm ERR! Log files were not written due to an error writing to the directory: /123/_logs
npm ERR! You can rerun the command with `--loglevel=verbose` to see the logs in your terminal

6. Just to demonstrate, now run with npm_config_offline=true, and it runs with the following output:

npm verb cli /home/.../.nvm/versions/node/v18.15.0/bin/node /home/.../.nvm/versions/node/v18.15.0/bin/npm
npm info using npm@9.6.1
npm info using node@v18.15.0
npm verb cache could not create cache: Error: EACCES: permission denied, mkdir '/123'
npm verb logfile could not create logs-dir: Error: EACCES: permission denied, mkdir '/123'
npm verb title npm run dummy
npm verb argv "run" "dummy" "--loglevel" "silly"
npm verb logfile logs-max:10 dir:/123/_logs/2023-03-13T12_58_32_261Z-
npm verb logfile could not be created: Error: ENOENT: no such file or directory, open '/123/_logs/2023-03-13T12_58_32_261Z-debug-0.log'
npm verb logfile no logfile created
npm sill logfile done cleaning log files

> dummy
> echo 'hello' && sleep 2 && echo 'Yeet!'

hello
Yeet!
npm verb exit 0
npm info ok 

Environment

• npm: 9.6.1
• Node.js: 18.15.0
• OS Name: Ubuntu Linux
• npm_config_cache set to unpermitted directory, such as /dummy.

[mvorisek]

I am facing this problem as well:

npm ERR! code 243
npm ERR! git dep preparation failed
npm ERR! command /usr/bin/node /usr/lib/node_modules/npm/bin/npm-cli.js install --force --cache=/github/home/.npm --prefer-offline=false --prefer-online=false --offline=false --no-progress --no-save --no-audit --include=dev --include=peer --include=optional --no-package-lock-only --no-dry-run
npm ERR! npm ERR! code EACCES
npm ERR! npm ERR! syscall open
npm ERR! npm ERR! path /github/home/.npm/_cacache/index-v5/c3/24/3bcf5990edce4f749f04b7e4602dae2ed3f0eb3e28ceffb776d0c623cce6
npm ERR! npm ERR! errno -13
npm ERR! npm ERR! 
npm ERR! npm ERR! Your cache folder contains root-owned files, due to a bug in
npm ERR! npm ERR! previous versions of npm which has since been addressed.
npm ERR! npm ERR! 
npm ERR! npm ERR! To permanently fix this problem, please run:
npm ERR! npm ERR!   sudo chown -R 1001:123 "/github/home/.npm"
npm ERR! 
npm ERR! npm ERR! A complete log of this run can be found in:
npm ERR! npm ERR!     /github/home/.npm/_logs/2023-05-17T11_18_34_563Z-debug-0.log

npm ERR! Your cache folder contains root-owned files, due to a bug in
npm ERR! previous versions of npm which has since been addressed.

log part is interesting, as run on clean Docker image /wo any populated cache and the problem is appearing randomly in about 1 of 5 runs. It seems like some race condition.

steps to reproduce:

1. use ghcr.io/mvorisek/image-php:8.0-selenium Docker image (basically a clean Alpine with node/npm - https://github.com/mvorisek/image-php/blob/3a4165d67e/data/8.0-alpine/Dockerfile)
2. checkout https://github.com/atk4/ui/tree/62020d257cf5f55b4d490f636808ab4d7f4bf372/js
3. cd js && npm install --package-lock-only --save-dev babel-plugin-istanbul nyc && npm ci --loglevel=error
4. as the problem does not appear always, run it like 1000 times /wo Docker caching and you should be able to reproduce it

[lukekarrys]

This was fixed by c7a592c as part of npm@10.2.5.