Rescript-compiler: `bs-platform` fails to install on npm >= 5.0.0

[nickpascucci]

Installing bs-platform fails with the following message on npm >= 5.0.0:

[17:07:58] ~/dev/dockerfiles/sandboxes/reasonml [master] λ docker run -it node:latest /bin/bash -c "npm install -g [email protected] && npm install -g bs-platform"
 /usr/local/bin/npm -> /usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/bin/npm-cli.js
 + [email protected]
 added 250 packages from 135 contributors, removed 317 packages and updated 38 packages in 14.742s
 /usr/local/bin/bsb -> /usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/lib/bsb
 /usr/local/bin/bsc -> /usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/lib/bsc
 /usr/local/bin/bsrefmt -> /usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/lib/bsrefmt

> [email protected] postinstall /usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform
> node scripts/install.js

No working prebuilt compiler
/bin/sh: 1: ocamlc.opt: not found
Build a local version of OCaml compiler, it may take a couple of minutes
touch: cannot touch 's.h': Permission denied
touch: cannot touch 'm.h': Permission denied
touch: cannot touch 'Makefile': Permission denied
./configure: 200: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 204: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 206: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 211: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 215: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 217: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 221: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
mkdir: cannot create directory '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/cg-51': Permission denied
config.guess: cannot create a temporary directory in /usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform
[ERROR!] Cannot guess host type. You must specify one with the -host option.

touch: cannot touch 's.h': Permission denied
touch: cannot touch 'm.h': Permission denied
touch: cannot touch 'Makefile': Permission denied
./configure: 200: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 204: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 206: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 211: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 215: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 217: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 221: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
mkdir: cannot create directory '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/cg-51': Permission denied
config.guess: cannot create a temporary directory in /usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform

Building a local version of the OCaml compiler failed, check the output above for more information. A possible problem is that you don't have a compiler installed.
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/scripts/install.js:111
            throw e;
                        ^

Error: Command failed: /usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/scripts/buildocaml.sh
touch: cannot touch 's.h': Permission denied
touch: cannot touch 'm.h': Permission denied
touch: cannot touch 'Makefile': Permission denied
./configure: 200: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 204: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 206: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 211: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 215: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 217: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
./configure: 221: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied
mkdir: cannot create directory '/usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/cg-51': Permission denied
config.guess: cannot create a temporary directory in /usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform

    at checkExecSyncError (child_process.js:603:11)
        at Object.execFileSync (child_process.js:621:13)
            at tryToProvideOCamlCompiler (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/scripts/install.js:106:27)
                at non_windows_npm_release (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/scripts/install.js:156:9)
                    at Object.<anonymous> (/usr/local/lib/node_modules/bs-platform/scripts/install.js:179:5)
                        at Module._compile (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:702:30)
                            at Object.Module._extensions..js (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:713:10)
                                at Module.load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:612:32)
                                    at tryModuleLoad (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:551:12)
                                        at Function.Module._load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:543:3)
                                        npm ERR! code ELIFECYCLE
                                        npm ERR! errno 1
                                        npm ERR! [email protected] postinstall: `node scripts/install.js`
                                        npm ERR! Exit status 1
                                        npm ERR!
                                        npm ERR! Failed at the [email protected] postinstall script.
                                        npm ERR! This is probably not a problem with npm. There is likely additional logging output above.

npm ERR! A complete log of this run can be found in:
npm ERR!     /root/.npm/_logs/2018-06-04T21_08_50_882Z-debug.log

Using npm 4.0.0 succeeds (docker run -it node:latest /bin/bash -c "npm install -g [email protected] && npm install -g bs-platform").

[bobzhang]

touch: cannot touch 's.h': Permission denied
touch: cannot touch 'm.h': Permission denied
touch: cannot touch 'Makefile': Permission denied
./configure: 200: ./configure: cannot create Makefile: Permission denied

this is probably a npm bug (we have hit npm bugs several times), can you try npm lts?

[nickpascucci]

I'm not sure which npm version would be lts, according to their wiki page here they don't have one.

[bobzhang]

@nickpascucci do you still have such issues with latest npm?

[coproduto]

Same thing happening here. Have tried with npm 5.5.1, 5.6.0 (current lts), and 6.1.0 (current latest). I use n to manage node versions.

[coproduto]

Installing with npm 4.0.0 does work.

[nickpascucci]

Tried it with npm 6.1.0, still failing. If you have Docker installed, the reproduction step is simple:

docker run -it node:latest /bin/bash -c "npm install -g npm@latest && npm --version && npm install -g bs-platform"

[theJian]

sudo npm install -g bs-platform --unsafe-perm
Works for me :smiley_cat:

[johnslay]

I was having all these issues and what worked for me was this:
sudo apt install build-essential
sudo npm install -g bs-platform --unsafe-perm

[YoussefLagtab]

what worked for me was:

1. Changing the owner of the global node_modules directory :
   sudo chown $USER:$USER /usr/lib/node_modules

1. Simply:
   npm install -g bs-platform

[nickpascucci]

It's good that there are workarounds, but none of the above is a solution - running installations with unsafe permissions enabled or chowning global directories shouldn't be necessary.

[YoussefLagtab]

Agreed! well, they have to figure whats going wrong and fix it!!

[amsterdamharu]

Just ran this under my own account:

yarn global add bs-platform

yarn version 1.9.2
node version: v10.8.0
Fedora 28

User is member of groups: wheel docker

Did not work with npm even as root

[nlfiedler]

The yarn approach one way around this, and I had to use that on FreeBSD. BTW, I tried this with the docker node:10 image (node 10.13.0, npm 6.4.1) and it still happens. The --unsafe-perm hack seems to work. Thanks for that.

[bobzhang]

seems to be fixed in recent versions.