dotenv doesn't seem to load any env variable - node.js

Question

I'm developing the standard Node+Express web app. Everything else is working fine, but I can't make the .env file to populate process.env
At first, I thought it was a scope problem since my app.js, where dotenv is called from, is within the src subfolder and .env is in the root. But using node tools and confirming it with a package called find-config, I have the correct absolute path. I've never gotten an ENOENT for a file not found.
I tried everything, from dotenv's debug thingy explained in the docs, to my own debugging, making sure everything is in place. This is my latest attempt:
const fs = require('fs');
const realpath = require('find-config')('.env');
console.log(dotenv.parse(fs.readFileSync(realpath)));
I've paused execution and asserted that indeed realpath is exactly the absolute .env path
And here's .env
NODE_ENV=development
NODE_HOST=localhost
NODE_PORT=8080
SESSION_SECRET=eX&frsz9M*3XqFKUrK6
The console.log outputs {}, which is consistent with every avenue I've tried: never an error, never a parsed object either. Just nothingness.
Doing this:
const results = JSON.stringify(dotenv.config({"path":"/100%/correct/path/.env"}));
It throws back {"parsed":{}}
I've become so suspicious that I downloaded, installed and run the mega Hackathon Starter repo of 29k stars, which uses the same method.
Initially, it doesn't work because the author used a relative path. With the absolute path it works.
A bit more info in case it helps:
/* =========== Dotenv troubleshooting ===========
*/
const realPath = path.join(__dirname, '../.env');
const buffer = fs.readFileSync(realPath);
const envConfig = dotenv.parse(buffer, {debug:true});
l(realPath);
l(buffer);
l(envConfig);
/* end of Dotenv troubleshooting ------------------ */
This logs the following:
> node server.js
SESSION_SECRET=blabla value when parsing line 1: NODE_ENV=development
19:06:11 info: /100%/correct/path/.env
19:06:11 info: <Buffer 4e 4f 44 45 5f 45 4e 56 3d 64 65 76 65 6c 6f 70 6d 65 6e 74 0d 4e 4f 44 45 5f 48 4f 53 54 3d 6c 6f 63 61 6c 68 6f 73 74 0d 4e 4f 44 45 5f 50 4f 52 54 ... 41 more bytes>
19:06:11 info: {}
And as you can tell, that buffer is indeed the file:
/100%/correct/path $ xxd .env
00000000: 4e4f 4445 5f45 4e56 3d64 6576 656c 6f70 NODE_ENV=develop
00000010: 6d65 6e74 0d4e 4f44 455f 484f 5354 3d6c ment.NODE_HOST=l

Answer 1

After too much time scrutinizing my code, I finally discovered the issue.
Depending on operating systems and down to files themselves (and text editors and IDEs), at the end of the line you can have a Line Feed ("LF") character (0x0A, \n), Carriage Return ("CR") character (0x0D, \r) or End of Line ("EOL") character (0x0D0A, \r\n).
Unfortunately, dotenv only understands \n as the end of a line. So it was a parsing issue due to the simplicity of the checking. As far as I know, however, \n is kind of the standard.
For some reason, the .env file was using \r as a line separator. So it was a quick fix:
In my case, using a JetBrains product you can configure in the settings to always use the same end of line.