A Twisted Maze of Dependencies

I’m usually a fan of Rachel’s writing, but this one just sounds like normal unfamiliarity with a language ecosystem.

Yes, Node.js programs have a lot of dependencies. That’s how the ecosystem works. Code is shipped as source and there’s a culture of code reuse. Nothing about this is bad or wrong.

ESLint is a good tool if you’re developing JS. The typical approach is to install it as a project dependency, using ‘npm install eslint —dev’ IIRC.

This probably falls under the category of "common knowledge" but:

1) Install a NodeJS version manager such as nvm.

2) The NodeJS ecosystem is a polluter that would qualify as and EPA super-fund site. Don't install anything using your OS package manager but rather install the tools you need for QA and build as project development dependencies.

One idea: use `—-no-install-recommends`.

Also in some cases (not necessarily this one) there may be multiple packages fulfilling the same dependency, so installing a specific dependency package explicitly may also reduce the total number of dependencies - otherwise you could end up accidentally pulling the whole KDE runtime if you’re not careful.