api: move the unload check to sub-commands function?

[yorkie]

Hey guys, I'm using npm api with Promise, but found the npm has a check on npm.load at https://github.com/npm/npm/blob/master/lib/npm.js#L175-L180. My code looks like:

const loadNpmAsync = Promise.promisify(npm.load)
const installNpmAsync = Promise.promisify(npm.commands.install)

The above would throw an unload error from lib/npm.js:176, which is caused by I accessed to the npm.commands out of the callback of npm.load, but actually at that moment, I don't want to call that function, just wanna promisify it, and will call the function in then after loadNpmAsync().

I also known we can do what I want like below:

const loadNpmAsync = Promise.promisify(npm.load)
loadNpmAsync().then(function () {
  const installNpmAsync = Promise.promisify(npm.commands.install)
})

IMHO, I just think if npm can put the unload check into sub-commands function calls, that would be neat more :)

[iarna]

We don't really support using the API today TBH, due to lots of weirdness in its shape (like this!). We strongly suggest that you call it with child_process instead.

[othiym23]

Yes – we have an outstanding project to remove the documentation for the API, as it's an attractive nuisance. We make no guarantees about its usefulness or fitness for any purpose other than supporting the operations of npm itself, and as such we're not going to make changes to how it's set up and used to support non-npm uses of it. I know this is a pain and probably a very unsatisfying situation for you, @yorkie, but we've got more important work right now.

[yorkie]

Okay, thanks a lot, it's fine :)