Importing node and express with typings in TypeScript

Question

I am trying to set up a TypeScript express/node application in Visual Studio Code following the Microsoft guide but changing it to use TypeScript however when it comes to instal

Answer 1

to save everyone a headache, the magic command to get the typings for node is now:

typings install node --source env --global --save

Answer 2

The tutorial I linked has now been updated to include the following commands:

typings install node --ambient
typings install express serve-static express-serve-static-core --ambient

See @cdbajorin 's comment for information about why dependencies are not automatically downloaded.

Answer 3

As of the release of TypeScript 2.0 last month, the recommended tool for installing typings is our trusty old friend npm instead of typings or tsd.

npm install @types/node --save

With npm, there's no need to worry about "global" or "ambient" installations anymore.

You also don't need to worry about adding <reference> tags to the top of your source files anymore; just drop the following property into your compilerOptions in tsconfig.json, and the TypeScript compiler will automatically find the npm typings you've installed:

"typeRoots": [ "node_modules/@types" ]

Here's a blog post that explains the change in some more detail: https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/typescript/2016/06/15/the-future-of-declaration-files/