npm@2.1.18: update to latest stable

[othiym23]

Updated by using npm install npm@2.1.18 to a staging directory, then copying that into deps/npm. See #252 for context. I would love to see a job automatically copying npm@latest into the tree on a weekly basis, and if there's a way I can help make this happen, please let me know.

[zeke]

👌

[bnoordhuis]

Thanks Forrest, landed in e79ccee with a slightly reworded commit log (one that conforms to what seems to be the statistically most significant commit template; it's pretty much all over the place, though.)

As to automatically upgrading: the rule is that at least one committer has to sign off on every change. If you can set up a cron job or something that automatically files a PR every week, that's fine by me. If you want something more advanced, @rvagg is probably the person you should talk to.

[Fishrock123]

Shouldn't we do this sorta as part of a release thing?

[rvagg]

@Fishrock123 yes we should, but it also needs to be properly tested prior to release where the actual release process is about taking a specific commit and releasing on that, not adding additional stuff to the codebase (except for turning on a boolean in node_version.h).

@othiym23 the Makefile is the place for some code that can at least semi-automate this process, a make update-npm target would be great, the commit & PR probably don't belong in there though. While you're there, there's a test-npm item in there and test-npm-publish too. Could you start thinking about updating those to make them a little more sophisticated so we can make them part of CI prior to release.

[othiym23]

@rvagg Starting with your last point first, a few months back I put together a probably overcomplicated patch to the Makefile to run all of the npm tests against the current Node build. I would be open to coming up with ways to clean that up for io.js use.

If you want an update-npm task inthe Makefile, I need to know how much of a bootstrap environment I can presume. Should we add something like the npm install.sh script that uses curl to get the dist tarball? Or can we presume that there will be a system npm installed on all CI environments?

[othiym23]

Thank you, @bnoordhuis!

[rvagg]

@othiym23 ok, if the existing thing in the Makefile is from you then that's fine my me.

Re bootstrap environment, don't count on a system installed npm or even node, it should be relatively self-contained with basic Unix tools (even the tests use some Unix tools like curl on Windows where it's assumed you'd have something at least as basic as Git Bash installed). You'd have the existing deps/npm available and you could have either ./out/Release/iojs or ./out/Debug/iojs available too if you wanted it (we could add a symlink for ./node to be more helpful.

A lot of these tooling tasks in the Makefile use Python to get the job done, it'll be safest to make the same assumption; that Python is there and aside from that it's just some basic Unix tools.

If it can be as simple as the install.sh then that might be ideal.

[othiym23]

If it can be as simple as the install.sh then that might be ideal.

That script

1. doesn't work on Windows
2. uses curl ;)

I won't be able to get to this pre-io.js 1.0.0 (because that's totally going to be released on @indutny's birthday, right?) but I'll try to set aside some time for this in the next month or so.

[othiym23]

Also, sounds like some mixture of Python and bootstrapping the built-in npm / iojs binaries is the way to go. (Just to make a note to myself -- anybody has a better idea, I'm all ears.)

[rvagg]

if all goes well then the it'll be released on the global "13th", but after a TC meeting which will flip @indutny into the 14th I think so it'll be a little bit delayed for his birthday!