isaacs/npm — Issue #1736: Update Windows install instructions
Author: chowey
Created: 2011-11-19 01:26:43+00:00
State: open

I am seeing a lot of issues with installing on Windows. I recently upgraded to Node v0.6.2, using the new .msi installer. The problem is, the .msi installer puts Node into the "Program Files" directory, which needs elevated privileges to modify.

Enter npm, which the Windows install instructions tell us to type "node cli.js install npm -gf".

This will *fail* unless you open the command prompt as an administrator. On Windows 7, this means you right click "Command Prompt" and say "Run as Administrator". Then it works no prob (at least for me).

Can we update the documentation somehow?

Obviously the choice of Node to install itself into "Program Files" will also affect any other npm installation with the "-g" flag, or any installation with scripts that try to put something into the Node path, so there really needs to be a red flag raised for Windows users to basically run npm as an administrator from now on.