env-node.md

node env

By default, every global that is in the Node.js runtime is available. The full list is here.

Example:

Good

var foo = require('foo');
module.exports = foo.bar;

Bad, use a tool like Browserify instead

if (typeof require === 'function' && typeof module === 'object' && module.exports) {
  var foo = require('foo');
  module.exports = foo.bar;
}

Justification

Node has a very small amount of globals, the important ones are require, module, exports, process, Buffer, __dirname and __filename. While none of these are available in the browser, they are all available in a compilation environment like Browserify. It is recommended to use something like Browserify to compile code for the browser, as it helps with modular codebases and gives you a consistent interface for your modules - you'll need to use require and module (unless you're using ES6 with import and export). Browserify also shims the other Node global variables like Buffer or __filename, and they can be very useful to use (a common pattern is using env vars like process.env.NODE_ENV).

For such a common set of globals, having to add guards incase of undefined globals would be a pain.

How to disable

If you don't want to set these variables as global, you can simply set the node env to false in your project config:

package.json (project-wide)

"eslintConfig": {
  "extends": ["strict/es5"],
  "env": {
    "node": false
  }
}

If you have a particular file you know you won't be using them for, you customise what envs you use by changing the eslint-env setting, from within a file:

*.js (file wide)

/*eslint-env builtin, browser */ // < list all environments this file needs