Undocumented option -2 for init - used in official install guide.

[rmplbv]

I'm a bit confused about the recommended install method (https://yarnpkg.com/getting-started/install)

• Why is the recommended Option -2 not documented? Neither in --help nor in the online documentation?
• Why does the recommended Option -2 all sort of things, like adding a .git folder, where - it looks like - nothing special is done, no hooks or anything else. At least all hooks have still a .sample ending.
• See also: Why does `yarn init -2` add EditorConfig #4277

[arcanis]

The -2 flag is an alias for --install stable, ie it runs yarn init w/ the latest version of Yarn, even if you run it from a 1.x binary. I think we'll likely look at making it the default once the 4.0 ships.

As for git etc, Yarn now does a bit more of what you would typically have to do yourself when bootstrapping a project. It doesn't install hooks, it just runs git init.

[polarathene]

Just to add to this as the "install" method was a bit confusing to me as well. It's initializing a new project, hence adding all those extra files in the directory when you run the command.

Instead if you know the version you want to use, you can either add that per-project with package.json with packageManager property: "packageManager": "yarn@3.6.3" or you can do the same without a package.json to set the global yarn version:

# Example environment to start from:
$ docker run --rm -it --workdir /tmp node:20-bookworm-slim bash
$ yarn -v
1.22.19

# You want to run these commands to install / upgrade yarn:
$ corepack enable
$ corepack prepare yarn@stable --activate
$ yarn -v
3.6.3

As you can see the corepack way is fairly flexible. Instead of @stable you could also use @3.6.3 if you like.

---

Personally, the above is nicer than the official yarn docs yarn init -2 experience:

$ docker run --rm -it --workdir /tmp node:20-bookworm-slim bash
$ yarn -v
1.22.19
$ yarn init -2
➤ YN0000: Retrieving https://repo.yarnpkg.com/3.6.3/packages/yarnpkg-cli/bin/yarn.js
➤ YN0000: Saving the new release in .yarn/releases/yarn-3.6.3.cjs
➤ YN0000: Done in 0s 411ms
{
  name: 'tmp',
  packageManager: 'yarn@3.6.3'
}
Internal Error: Process git failed to spawn
    at ChildProcess.<anonymous> (/tmp/.yarn/releases/yarn-3.6.3.cjs:392:5563)
    at ChildProcess.emit (node:events:514:28)
    at ChildProcess._handle.onexit (node:internal/child_process:292:12)
    at onErrorNT (node:internal/child_process:484:16)
    at process.processTicksAndRejections (node:internal/process/task_queues:82:21)
error Command failed.
Exit code: 1
Command: /usr/local/bin/node
Arguments: /opt/yarn-v1.22.19/bin/yarn.js init -2
Directory: /tmp
Output:

info Visit https://yarnpkg.com/en/docs/cli/init for documentation about this command.

$ ls -la
total 48
drwxrwxrwt 1 root root 4096 Sep 21 04:46 .
drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 4096 Sep 21 04:46 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root  134 Sep 21 04:46 .editorconfig
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root  142 Sep 21 04:46 .gitattributes
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root  251 Sep 21 04:46 .gitignore
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Sep 21 04:46 .yarn
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root   40 Sep 21 04:46 .yarnrc.yml
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root    6 Sep 21 04:46 README.md
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root   54 Sep 21 04:46 package.json
drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 4096 Sep 11 17:21 v8-compile-cache-0
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root    0 Sep 21 04:46 yarn.lock

$ yarn -v
3.6.3