I have developed a Typescript library that I bundle as an npm module. During the development of my frontend application, I easily integrated this library using yarn link.
As I set up GitLab CI for other developers to work on the frontend application, I am facing challenges with distributing this package.
The possible solutions I have considered and the issues I am encountering are:
yarn add <git-url>
While this adds the source code, it remains uncompiled due to being in typescript. Compiling multiple files using the same tsconfig.json is not working for me, only one file gets compiled.
Moreover, developers' machines blocking port :22 hinders them from using git+ssh, making it difficult for both developers and CI to retrieve this package successfully.
yarn add tar-ball
Even when attempting to use a tarball, there isn't a clear way to store it. GitLab doesn't provide access to artifacts generated from builds for other CI pipelines.
- vendoring the package
To tackle this issue, I decided to include the node module in the git repository. However, I haven't found a reliable way to prevent yarn from automatically removing this package. Including the library in node_modules results in its removal upon running yarn.
Although switching to a private npm module is an option, I believe there should be simpler alternatives for distributing internal packages if you already have a well-functioning GitLab environment.
Is there a way to privately distribute a Typescript package without relying on an NPM private registry?