Parse package name and specifier passed to commands like npm install or npm cache add. This just parses the text given-- it's worth noting that npm has further logic it applies by looking at your disk to figure out what ambiguous specifiers are. If you want that logic, please see realize-package-specifier.

Arguments look like: foo@1.2, @bar/foo@1.2, foo@user/foo, http://x.com/foo.tgz, git+https://github.com/user/foo, bitbucket:user/foo, foo.tar.gz or bar

var assert = require("assert")
var npa = require("npm-package-arg")

// Pass in the descriptor, and it'll return an object
var parsed = npa("@bar/foo@1.2")

// Returns an object like:
{
  raw: '@bar/foo@1.2',       // what was passed in
  name: '@bar/foo',          // the name of the package
  escapedName: '@bar%2ffoo', // the escaped name, for making requests against a registry
  scope: '@bar',             // the scope of the package, or null
  type: 'range',             // the type of specifier this is
  spec: '>=1.2.0 <1.3.0',    // the expanded specifier
  rawSpec: '1.2'             // the specifier as passed in
 }

// Parsing urls pointing at hosted git services produces a variation:
var parsed = npa("git+https://github.com/user/foo")

// Returns an object like:
{
  raw: 'git+https://github.com/user/foo',
  scope: null,
  name: null,
  escapedName: null,
  rawSpec: 'git+https://github.com/user/foo',
  spec: 'user/foo',
  type: 'hosted',
  hosted: {
    type: 'github',
    ssh: 'git@github.com:user/foo.git',
    sshurl: 'git+ssh://git@github.com/user/foo.git',
    https: 'https://github.com/user/foo.git',
    directUrl: 'https://raw.githubusercontent.com/user/foo/master/package.json'
  }
}

// Completely unreasonable invalid garbage throws an error
// Make sure you wrap this in a try/catch if you have not
// already sanitized the inputs!
assert.throws(function() {
  npa("this is not \0 a valid package name or url")
})

var npa = require('npm-package-arg')

• var result = npa(arg)

Parses arg and returns a result object detailing what arg is.

arg -- a package descriptor, like: foo@1.2, or foo@user/foo, or http://x.com/foo.tgz, or git+https://github.com/user/foo

The objects that are returned by npm-package-arg contain the following keys:

• name - If known, the name field expected in the resulting pkg.
• type - One of the following strings:
  • git - A git repo
  • hosted - A hosted project, from github, bitbucket or gitlab. Originally either a full url pointing at one of these services or a shorthand like user/project or github:user/project for github or bitbucket:user/project for bitbucket.
  • tag - A tagged version, like "foo@latest"
  • version - A specific version number, like "foo@1.2.3"
  • range - A version range, like "foo@2.x"
  • local - A local file or folder path
  • remote - An http url (presumably to a tgz)
• spec - The "thing". URL, the range, git repo, etc.
• hosted - If type=hosted this will be an object with the following keys:
  • type - github, bitbucket or gitlab
  • ssh - The ssh path for this git repo
  • sshUrl - The ssh URL for this git repo
  • httpsUrl - The HTTPS URL for this git repo
  • directUrl - The URL for the package.json in this git repo
• raw - The original un-modified string that was provided.
• rawSpec - The part after the name@..., as it was originally provided.
• scope - If a name is something like @org/module then the scope field will be set to @org. If it doesn't have a scoped name, then scope is null.
• escapedName - A version of name escaped to match the npm scoped packages specification. Mostly used when making requests against a registry. When name is null, escapedName will also be null.

If you only include a name and no specifier part, eg, foo or foo@ then a default of latest will be used (as of 4.1.0). This is contrast with previous behavior where * was used.