Lerna-Lite 🐉

Lerna-Lite is a super light version of the original Lerna

• About Lerna-Lite
  • Why create this lib/fork?
• Getting Started
  • Installation
  • JSON Schema
  • Migration for existing Lerna users
• Project Demo - See it in Action
• README Badge
• lerna.json config file
• Contributions
• Troubleshooting
• Commands
  • included with CLI
    • 🛠️ init - creates a new Lerna-Lite repo (creates lerna.json and a workspace structure)
    • 💻 info - print local environment information (useful when opening new issue)
    • ☁️ publish - publish every workspace packages that changed
    • 📑 version - create new version for each workspace packages
  • optional commands (requires separate install, refer to the installation table shown below)
    • 🕜 changed - list local packages that changed since last tagged release
    • 🌓 diff - git diff all packages or a single package since the last release
    • 👷 exec - execute shell command in each workspace package
    • 📖 list - list local packages
    • 🏃 run - run npm script in each workspace packages

📢 Lerna-Lite now supports pnpm/yarn workspace: protocol

Take 30sec. to complete this 1 question poll survey 🔘 if you are using this feature. It's a simple poll to find out which package manager is the most popular with this new workspace: protocol feature. Thanks

Lerna-Lite itself is now also using pnpm workspaces with the workspace: protocol as well, woohoo 🎉

We strongly suggest the use of the new opt-in flag --sync-workspace-lock to automatically update your lock file 🔒

License

MIT License

About Lerna-Lite

Lerna-Lite differs from the original Lerna in the sense that it only has a limited subset of commands from Lerna which itself has 15 commands, while Lerna-Lite only includes half of them (and a few are optional). Lerna was originally built as an all-in-one tool, however nowadays Workspaces are available in all package managers and the need for an all-in-one tool which includes built-in workspaces functionalities is no longer necessary. Lerna-Lite is built around this new reality and its CLI only includes the minimum commands which are init, info, publish and version, while other commands are available (exec, list, run, ...) they are totally optional and you won't download them unless you choose to do so. In summary, Lerna-Lite is more modular than the original Lerna and with this small change, you'll end up with less dependencies to download and install, this also make it more versatile to use with other tools like Turborepo, pnpm and others...

As a summary, Lerna-Lite assumes, and requires to pre-setup a Workspace through your favorite package manager (npm, pnpm, yarn) that will take care of the symlinks (Lerna-Lite does not include the bootstrap, neither link commands hence the need for a workspace pre-setup), so make sure that your workspace is properly setup before installing Lerna-Lite.

For more info on how to setup a workspace, choose the best option for you: Yarn classic / Yarn 2+ / pnpm / npm 7+

Why create this lib/fork?

Mainly for the following reasons:

1. original Lerna repo was unmaintained for nearly 2 years (dependencies were out of date)
   • this is no longer true since Nrwl took over stewardship of Lerna, but the next few points are still valid
   • we now keep PRs in sync with the original Lerna
2. a desire to create a smaller and more modular lib that is lighter than the original all-in-one Lerna
   • it's smaller since we only copied half of Lerna's commands and many of them are totally optional.
   • we don't need bootstrap anymore since Workspaces are supported by all package managers.
   • the main goal of this fork was to keep only version and publish commands in the core and make everything else optional (choose and install what you really need).
3. rewrite the lib in TypeScript for type checking and to be compatible with ESM
4. replicate a few opened PRs (fixes and features) from Lerna and also add extra features in Lerna-Lite
   • for example we support yarn/pnpm workspace: protocol, we added changelog headers, and added dry-run options
5. Lerna v5 is now installing Nx as a required dependency, want it or not, while it remains optional in Lerna-Lite
   • even if Nx can be a nice addition with lerna run and useNx (which we did add), it should and will always be optional in Lerna-Lite, it's your decision.
6. Lerna v5 is now also enforcing useWorkspaces option to be enabled, but this can have undesired effects (you might want to track only the packages folder with Lerna and not other folders like demo or website). Again, that will not be enforced in Lerna-Lite, in fact it's the opposite, I personally prefer to just use packages in lerna.json (especially with pnpm)

This lib will help you with

Version and Publish commands (included with the CLI)

• Automate the rolling of new Versions (independent or fixed) of all your workspace packages.
  • it will automatically Commit/Tag your new Version & create new GitHub/GitLab Release (when enabled).
• Automate the creation of Changelogs for all your packages by reading all Conventional Commits.
  • each package will get its own Changelog and a merged Changelog will also be created in the root.
• Automate the repository Publishing of your new version for all your packages (NPM or other platform).

Other useful, but optional, commands

• Changed command, when installed, will list all local packages that have changed since the last tagged release
• Diff command, when installed, will show git diff of all packages or a single package since the last release
• Exec command, when installed, will help you execute shell commands in parallel and in topological order.
• List command, when installed, will list all workspace local packages
• Run command, when installed, will help you run npm script in parallel and in topological order.

README Badge

[![lerna--lite](https://img.shields.io/badge/maintained%20with-lerna--lite-e137ff)](https://github.com/ghiscoding/lerna-lite)

Getting Started

Let's start by installing Lerna as a dev dependency of your project and run the init command to get started (see init#readme for all options).

$ mkdir lerna-repo
$ cd lerna-repo
$ npx lerna init # with pnpm

# for npm/yarn (only) workspaces add --use-workspaces
$ npx lerna init --use-workspaces

This will create a lerna.json configuration file as well as a packages folder, so your folder should now look like this:

lerna-repo/
  packages/
    package-a
  package.json
  lerna.json

Note that package-a will not be created, it is only shown shown here to help clarify the structure. For more info and full details about the lerna.json file, you can read the lerna.json Wiki.

Installation

Run the following commands to install Lerna-Lite in your project and/or install it globally by adding the -g option.

If you are new to Lerna-Lite, you could also run the lerna init command which will create the lerna.json for you with a minimal setup. If you are using a different client other than npm, then make sure to update the npmClient property in lerna.json (for example: "npmClient": "yarn").

JSON Schema

You can add the $schema property into your lerna.json to take advantage of Lerna-Lite JSON Schema (lerna init will automatically configure this for you). This will help with the developer experience, users can see what properties are valid with a brief description of what they do (taken from the lerna command options documentation).

lerna.json

{
  "$schema": "node_modules/@lerna-lite/cli/schemas/lerna-schema.json",
  // ...
}

CLI Installation

npm i @lerna-lite/cli -D -W

Minimum CLI install to get started with Lerna-Lite, that will give you access to the following list of commands:

Note: Lerna-Lite CLI is only including 4 built-in commands by default (shown in table above), all other commands are optional commands and must be installed separately as shown in the table below.

Separate / Optional Installs

Usage

Add custom NPM Scripts or simply run the commands in a shell with Lerna-Lite CLI, below are a few very simple demo scripts.

// package.json / npm scripts
"scripts": {
  "new-version": "lerna version",
  "new-publish": "lerna publish from-package",

  "exec-echo": "lerna exec echo hello", // optional `exec` command
  "run-tests": "lerna run test",        // optional `run` command
}

Migration for existing Lerna Users

If you are migrating from Lerna, it should be fairly easy to just replace Lerna with Lerna-Lite in your dependencies and that's about it, the CLI commands are the same, take a look at the quick steps shown below:

1. remove Lerna from your local & global dependencies

npm uninstall lerna -W   # OR yarn remove lerna -W
npm uninstall -g lerna   # OR yarn global remove lerna

2. install Lerna-Lite CLI to get access to init, info, version and publish commands

# Lerna CLI (includes `init`, `info`, `version` and `publish` commands)
npm install @lerna-lite/cli -D -W

3. optionally install changed, diff, exec, list and/or run commands (refer to installation table)

# install any of the optional commands (refer to installation table)
npm install @lerna-lite/run -D -W

Project Demo?

You want to see a project demo? Sure, you're looking at it 😉

Yes indeed, this lib was originally created as an NPM Workspace and later changed to a pnpm workspaces for the sole purpose of demoing and testing its own code. All changelogs and published versions are created and published by the lib itself, how sweet is that? You will also find that Lerna-Lite project has its own lerna.json config file to run properly (take a look to see how it works).

See it in Action 🎦

You can see a small video of a new version release on this Release Demo - Wiki to demonstrate its usage. Confused with all these options? Perhaps taking a look at some of the references shown below might help you get started.

Good Lerna Tutorials / References

• Release Demo - Wiki - Lerna-Lite demo (animated gif)
• How to Use Lerna - YouTube video
• Lerna Release Workflow - GitHub Template

Contributions

Feel free to contribute any Pull Request. Also please note that I'm just a simple developer & user of this lib, the same as you are, my knowledge of the library is also limited but together we can make it better.

Development / Contributions

If you wish to contribute to the project, please follow these steps:

Note: this project uses pnpm workspaces, you can install pnpm by following their installation or simply run npx pnpm to run any of the pnpm scripts shown below:

1. clone the lib:
   • git clone https://github.com/ghiscoding/lerna-lite
2. install with pnpm from the root:
   • pnpm install OR npx pnpm install
3. run a full TypeScript (TSC) build
   • pnpm build OR npx pnpm build
4. add/run Jest unit tests (make sure to run the previous steps first):
   • pnpm jest (full test coverage)
   • pnpm jest:watch (watch mode)
5. you can also troubleshoot/debug via the VSCode debugger launch configs that were setup for each command

Troubleshooting

If you have problems running the lib and your problems are related to Git commands that were executed, then we suggest to first try with the --git-dry-run (or --cmd-dry-run) option to see if it helps in finding the error(s) you may have. Another great, and possibly much more useful suggestion, is to search in the original Lerna issues list and see if any solution could help you (remember that Lerna-Lite is a fork of the original code from Lerna and it works the same way). Lastly, if that is not enough and you wish to troubleshoot yourself, then read this Troubleshooting - Wiki to possibly troubleshoot yourself in your own environment.

Lerna-Lite Full List of Packages

Package Name	Version	Description	Changes
@lerna-lite/cli		Lerna-Lite Init/Info/Version/Publish comands CLI	changelog
@lerna-lite/core		Lerna-Lite core & shared methods (internal use)	changelog
@lerna-lite/info		Print local environment information	changelog
@lerna-lite/init		create a new Lerna-Lite repo	changelog
@lerna-lite/publish		Publish packages in the current workspace	changelog
@lerna-lite/version		Bump Version & write Changelogs	changelog
@lerna-lite/exec		Execute shell command in current workspace	changelog
@lerna-lite/changed		List local packages that changed since last release	changelog
@lerna-lite/diff		Diff all packages or a single package since last release	changelog
@lerna-lite/list		List local packages	changelog
@lerna-lite/listable		Listable utils used by list and changed commands (internal use)	changelog
@lerna-lite/run		Run npm scripts in current workspace	changelog
@lerna-lite/optional-cmd-common		Lerna-Lite common utils for optional commands Exec/List/Run (internal use)	changelog