NPM no longer working

Question

so I wasn't paying attention and ran this command-

npm install npm install jasmine-node -g 

which caused this -

    npm http GET https://registry.npmjs.org/install npm http GET https://registry.npmjs.org/jasmine-node npm http GET https://registry.npmjs.org/npm npm http 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/install npm http GET https://registry.npmjs.org/install/-/install-0.1.7.tgz npm http 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/install/-/install-0.1.7.tgz npm http 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/jasmine-node npm http GET https://registry.npmjs.org/jasmine-node/-/jasmine-node-1.4.0.tgz npm http 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/jasmine-node/-/jasmine-node-1.4.0.tgz npm http 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/npm npm http GET https://registry.npmjs.org/npm/-/npm-1.2.15.tgz npm http 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/npm/-/npm-1.2.15.tgz npm ERR! Error: EACCES, mkdir '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/install' npm ERR!  { [Error: EACCES, mkdir '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/install'] npm ERR!   errno: 3, npm ERR!   code: 'EACCES', npm ERR!   path: '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/install', npm ERR!   fstream_type: 'Directory', npm ERR!   fstream_path: '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/install', npm ERR!   fstream_class: 'DirWriter', npm ERR!   fstream_stack:  npm ERR!    [ 'DirWriter._create (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/fstream/lib/dir-writer.js:36:23)', npm ERR!      '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/mkdirp/index.js:37:53', npm ERR!      'Object.oncomplete (fs.js:297:15)' ] } npm ERR!  npm ERR! Please try running this command again as root/Administrator.  npm ERR! System Darwin 12.0.0 npm ERR! command "node" "/usr/local/bin/npm" "install" "npm" "install" "jasmine-node" "-g" npm ERR! cwd /Users/psanker/Google Drive/Coding/Javascript/WhatsGoingOn npm ERR! node -v v0.8.17 npm ERR! npm -v 1.2.0 npm ERR! path /usr/local/lib/node_modules/install npm ERR! fstream_path /usr/local/lib/node_modules/install npm ERR! fstream_type Directory npm ERR! fstream_class DirWriter npm ERR! code EACCES npm ERR! errno 3 npm ERR! stack Error: EACCES, mkdir '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/install' npm ERR! fstream_stack DirWriter._create (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/fstream/lib/dir-writer.js:36:23) npm ERR! fstream_stack /usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/mkdirp/index.js:37:53 npm ERR! fstream_stack Object.oncomplete (fs.js:297:15) npm ERR! Error: EACCES, mkdir '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/jasmine-node' npm ERR!  { [Error: EACCES, mkdir '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/jasmine-node'] npm ERR!   errno: 3, npm ERR!   code: 'EACCES', npm ERR!   path: '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/jasmine-node', npm ERR!   fstream_type: 'Directory', npm ERR!   fstream_path: '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/jasmine-node', npm ERR!   fstream_class: 'DirWriter', npm ERR!   fstream_stack:  npm ERR!    [ 'DirWriter._create (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/fstream/lib/dir-writer.js:36:23)', npm ERR!      '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/mkdirp/index.js:37:53', npm ERR!      'Object.oncomplete (fs.js:297:15)' ] } npm ERR!  npm ERR! Please try running this command again as root/Administrator.  npm ERR! System Darwin 12.0.0 npm ERR! command "node" "/usr/local/bin/npm" "install" "npm" "install" "jasmine-node" "-g" npm ERR! cwd /Users/psanker/Google Drive/Coding/Javascript/WhatsGoingOn npm ERR! node -v v0.8.17 npm ERR! npm -v 1.2.0 npm ERR! path /usr/local/lib/node_modules/jasmine-node npm ERR! fstream_path /usr/local/lib/node_modules/jasmine-node npm ERR! fstream_type Directory npm ERR! fstream_class DirWriter npm ERR! code EACCES npm ERR! errno 3 npm ERR! stack Error: EACCES, mkdir '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/jasmine-node' npm ERR! fstream_stack DirWriter._create (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/fstream/lib/dir-writer.js:36:23) npm ERR! fstream_stack /usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/mkdirp/index.js:37:53 npm ERR! fstream_stack Object.oncomplete (fs.js:297:15) npm ERR! error rolling back Error: EACCES, unlink '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm' npm ERR! error rolling back  [email protected] { [Error: EACCES, unlink '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm'] npm ERR! error rolling back   errno: 3, npm ERR! error rolling back   code: 'EACCES', npm ERR! error rolling back   path: '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm' } npm ERR! Error: EACCES, unlink '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm' npm ERR!  { [Error: EACCES, unlink '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm'] npm ERR!   errno: 3, npm ERR!   code: 'EACCES', npm ERR!   path: '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm' } npm ERR!  npm ERR! Please try running this command again as root/Administrator.  npm ERR! System Darwin 12.0.0 npm ERR! command "node" "/usr/local/bin/npm" "install" "npm" "install" "jasmine-node" "-g" npm ERR! cwd /Users/psanker/Google Drive/Coding/Javascript/WhatsGoingOn npm ERR! node -v v0.8.17 npm ERR! npm -v 1.2.0 npm ERR! path /usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm npm ERR! code EACCES npm ERR! errno 3 npm ERR! stack Error: EACCES, unlink '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm' npm ERR!  npm ERR! Additional logging details can be found in: npm ERR!     /Users/psanker/Google Drive/Coding/Javascript/WhatsGoingOn/npm-debug.log npm ERR! not ok code 0 

Now when I try and run

npm install jasmine-node -g 

I get

-bash: /usr/local/bin/npm: No such file or directory 

What's going on?

Answer 1

When you run npm install -g somepackage, you may get an EACCES error asking you to run the command again as root/Administrator. It's a permissions issue.

It's easy to fix, open your terminal (Applications > Utilities > Terminal)

sudo chown -R $USER /usr/local 

** I strongly recommend you to not use the package management with sudo (sudo npm -g install something), because you can get some issues later **

Reference: http://foohack.com/2010/08/intro-to-npm/

** Update **

The reason is because this can cause permissions problems with lots of other apps, so I'd suggest not doing this.

A better solution when you are installing globally:

sudo chown -R `whoami` ~/.npm