Provided by: npm_8.5.1~ds-1_all 
NAME
npm-explain - Explain installed packages
Synopsis
npm explain <folder | specifier>
alias: why
Description
This command will print the chain of dependencies causing a given package to be installed in the current
project.
Positional arguments can be either folders within node_modules, or name@version-range specifiers, which
will select the dependency relationships to explain.
For example, running npm explain glob within npm's source tree will show:
glob@7.1.6
node_modules/glob
glob@"^7.1.4" from the root project
glob@7.1.1 dev
node_modules/tacks/node_modules/glob
glob@"^7.0.5" from rimraf@2.6.2
node_modules/tacks/node_modules/rimraf
rimraf@"^2.6.2" from tacks@1.3.0
node_modules/tacks
dev tacks@"^1.3.0" from the root project
To explain just the package residing at a specific folder, pass that as the argument to the command.
This can be useful when trying to figure out exactly why a given dependency is being duplicated to
satisfy conflicting version requirements within the project.
$ npm explain node_modules/nyc/node_modules/find-up
find-up@3.0.0 dev
node_modules/nyc/node_modules/find-up
find-up@"^3.0.0" from nyc@14.1.1
node_modules/nyc
nyc@"^14.1.1" from tap@14.10.8
node_modules/tap
dev tap@"^14.10.8" from the root project
Configuration
<!-- AUTOGENERATED CONFIG DESCRIPTIONS START --> <!-- automatically generated, do not edit manually -->
<!-- see lib/utils/config/definitions.js -->
json
• Default: false
• Type: Boolean
Whether or not to output JSON data, rather than the normal output.
• In npm pkg set it enables parsing set values with JSON.parse() before saving them to your package.json.
Not supported by all npm commands. <!-- automatically generated, do not edit manually --> <!-- see
lib/utils/config/definitions.js -->
workspace
• Default:
• Type: String (can be set multiple times)
Enable running a command in the context of the configured workspaces of the current project while
filtering by running only the workspaces defined by this configuration option.
Valid values for the workspace config are either:
• Workspace names
• Path to a workspace directory
• Path to a parent workspace directory (will result in selecting all workspaces within that folder)
When set for the npm init command, this may be set to the folder of a workspace which does not yet exist,
to create the folder and set it up as a brand new workspace within the project.
This value is not exported to the environment for child processes. <!-- automatically generated, do not
edit manually --> <!-- see lib/utils/config/definitions.js -->
<!-- AUTOGENERATED CONFIG DESCRIPTIONS END -->
See Also
• npm help config
• npm help npmrc
• npm help folders
• npm help ls
• npm help install
• npm help link
• npm help prune
• npm help outdated
• npm help update
undefined NaN NPM-EXPLAIN(1)