What is the use of module.parent in node.js? How can I refer to the require()ing module?

Question

I was looking in the node.js module documentation, and noticed that each module has a property- module.parent. I tried to use it, but got burnt by the module caching- module.parent only ever seems to the module that first require()'d it, irrespective of current context.

So what is the usage of it? Is there any other way for me to get a reference to the current require()ing module? Right now I'm wrapping the module in a function, so that it is called like:

require("mylibrary")(module) 

but that seems sub-optimal.

Answer 1

The "parent" is the module that caused the script to be interpreted (and cached), if any:

// $ node foo.js console.log(module.parent); // `null` 

// require('./foo') console.log(module.parent); // `{ ... }` 

What you're expecting is the "caller," which Node doesn't retain for you. For that, you'll need the exported function you're currently using to be a closure for the value.