[Heartbeat] NPM-less synthetics execution

[andrewvc]

We currently execute synthetics journeys using NPM, but this is less than ideal. NPM is big and complex, ideally we'd just run node. It also sometimes makes network requests and is a little tricky to run in a minimal offline fashion.

Some options we could explore:

1. Just using ln -s to install libs, but still using NPM for things to work
2. Combining the synthetics lib with the compiled project to form a single file of JS that node can execute
3. Something else

CC @vigneshshanmugam

[elasticmachine]

Pinging @elastic/uptime (Team:Uptime)

[paulb-elastic]

With https://github.com/elastic/beats/pull/34936, this can be closed

[vigneshshanmugam]

@paulb-elastic This is not done on the other issue. The issue is more about moving away from calling npm install and basically symlinking the global elastic package in other way to avoid time spent on the installation phase.

We can move this to the backlog and work on it as a future enhancement.

[paulb-elastic]

@andrewvc ^^ (reopening and putting on the backlog)

[botelastic[bot]]

Hi! We just realized that we haven't looked into this issue in a while. We're sorry!

We're labeling this issue as Stale to make it hit our filters and make sure we get back to it as soon as possible. In the meantime, it'd be extremely helpful if you could take a look at it as well and confirm its relevance. A simple comment with a nice emoji will be enough :+1. Thank you for your contribution!