Fallback to install <name> when install <tarball file> failed

[XeCycle]

npm install module-name-on-npmjs-registry will fail if a file with the same name exists in cwd, but is not a valid module tarball. E.g.:

mkdir temp
cd temp
touch lodash
npm i lodash

--- fail.

[kenany]

@XeCycle So you think npm should first assume registry?

[XeCycle]

@kenany Yes, that covers more cases. To force installing a local tarball one can say install ./tarball-file-name, if that name exists in the registry, but the reverse is difficult; using user/name may also fail if user/name exists in cwd.

[iarna]

The current behavior was intended when this was implemented, as such I'm flagging this as a feature request.

[iarna]

It’s my view that this adds additional complexity to story around package arguments as they’re passed to npm install. npm went through several variations on how it resolved local arguments when they were first added and the current behavior seemed to be the least confusing solution. The consensus of the CLI team is that this isn’t something we’re going to implement or accept as a pull request. As such, I’m going to close this issue, but thank you for bringing this up.