How to upgrade node.js on Windows?

Question

I already have Node.js v0.8.0 running on Windows. Can I just run the latest installer to upgrade it to v0.8.4? I am afraid it will break existing third party modules on my machi

Answer 1

For the record, I have just gone through the process, and it is painless even if you upgrade to another major version.

I have moved from 0.8 to 0.10, using the .msi package, overwriting the one installed on my system. Package problems were all fixed with npm update -g. Worked like a charm.

In case it does not work like a charm:

npm cache clean usually fixes the problem. Once the cache is empty, just run npm update -g again.

In case you really run into trouble:

Delete the modules you have installed globally, then reinstall them. Here's how:

• Take stock of what you have: npm list -g --depth=0 lists all top-level packages, with version numbers. npm list -g --parseable --depth=0 > npm-global-modules.txt writes them to a file in your cwd.

  Any strange stuff you didn't install yourself has probably been installed by another module (rare, but I have seen it happen). Remove those modules from the list. Also remove the module "npm".

• In an editor, format the output for the command line by replacing \n?[^\n]+[\\/] (regex) with a single space.

  (I didn't get this to work with findstr in a pipe, hence the roundtrip to the editor. You can also do it manually, of course ;)

• Delete all modules. On Windows, delete (or rename) the %appdata%\npm directory. For other OS, see Command to remove all npm modules globally?

• Reinstall the modules with npm install -g [your module list here]. Don't forget to npm cache clean before you do it.