NPM not creating .bin directory - node.js

Question

I'm using npm v1.4.4 and node v0.10.25 on Mac OS X 10.9.2.
I've recently upgraded node and npm, and now npm install is no longer creating the .bin directory in node_modules.
I've deleted node_modules, tried npm install again, but the directory and binaries are never created.
Does anybody have any ideas as to why this is happening?
Here is my package.json:
{
"name": "redacted",
"author": {},
"description": "redacted",
"dependencies": {
},
"devDependencies": {
"karma": "*",
"karma-coverage": "0.1.2",
"karma-junit-reporter": "*",
"karma-coffee-preprocessor": "~0.1",
"grunt": "^0.4.2",
"grunt-contrib-requirejs": "^0.4.3",
"grunt-contrib-concat": "^0.3.0",
"grunt-contrib-sass": "^0.7.2",
"grunt-contrib-htmlmin": "^0.2.0",
"grunt-contrib-cssmin": "^0.7.0",
"grunt-contrib-coffee": "^0.10.1",
"grunt-contrib-uglify": "^0.3.3",
"grunt-contrib-jst": "^0.5.1",
"grunt-contrib-qunit": "^0.4.0",
"grunt-contrib-jshint": "^0.8.0",
"grunt-contrib-watch": "^0.5.3",
"grunt-contrib-jasmine": "^0.6.1",
"grunt-contrib-compress": "^0.6.1",
"grunt-contrib-handlebars": "^0.6.1",
"grunt-contrib-less": "^0.9.0",
"grunt-contrib": "^0.9.0"
}
}

Answer 1

I know this is an old post but I experienced the same issue recently. I had copied files from an existing project including package.json and package-lock.json. The package-lock.json was what prevented the node_module/.bin directory from being created.
The solution was to delete the node_modules directory and package-lock.json and run npm install again

Answer 2

The ./node_modules/.bin directory is where npm creates links to a node package's binary. From https://docs.npmjs.com/files/folders#executables
Executables
When in global mode, executables are linked into
{prefix}/bin on Unix, or directly into {prefix} on Windows.
When in local mode, executables are linked into ./node_modules/.bin so
that they can be made available to scripts run through npm. (For
example, so that a test runner will be in the path when you run npm
test.)
The package.json you pasted above do not have a bin section. Take a look at this example from npm's package.json
{
"version": "1.4.9",
"name": "npm",
"publishConfig": {
"proprietary-attribs": false
},
"description": "A package manager for node",
...
...
"main": "./lib/npm.js",
"bin": "./bin/npm-cli.js",
"dependencies": {
"abbrev": "~1.0.4",
"ansi": "~0.2.1",
...
...
Specifically the line "bin": "./bin/npm-cli.js" will tell npm to create a link at ./node_modules/.bin/npm to node_modules/npm/npm-cli.js

Answer 3

Seems that all your dependencies are dev dependencies.
Could you see if your NODE_ENV environment variable is set to production now? If yes you will need to change it back.
Also, any error happened during installation?

Answer 4

If all packages installed, only the .bin is gone.
you can just run npm rebuild

Answer 5

In my case I had webpack running in watch mode in another console window. I did not get any errors during npm install so it took me a moment to notice.
Ensure the dependencies are not in use, such as karma running tests or webpack running in watch mode
Delete the dependency folders, such as node_modules/karma, or the entire node_modules folder. NPM does not seem to create symlink files in .bin folder if dependency folder already exists.
Retry npm install
With NPM 6.7.0.

Answer 6

Not really an answer to your question, but because I had a similar situation: I run npm with the --no-bin-links option on my VM so my windows host doesn't complain. And then later I don't find the bin links folder... duh!

Answer 7

This could happen because of the broken npm. Try following command from the npm troubleshooting and it should just work fine.
curl -L https://www.npmjs.org/install.sh | sh