Unittest node helper and npm dependency issues

[kakyoism]

I'm facing a weird npm dependency issue when trying to install node-red-node-test-helper with custom nodes and a globally installed Node-RED v2.0.5.

The expected dependency situation is like this:

• All custom nodes share one globally-installed Node-RED v2.0.5
• Each custom node package depends on node-red-node-test-helper as dev-dependency
• Those custom node package does not have to depend on Node-RED in its package.json explicitly

In my practice, I'm getting complaints about missing node-red dependency when running npm test after doing the following:

• add node-red-node-test-helper as dev-dependency to a custom node's package.json
• run npm install /path/to/npm/node_modules/node-red --no-save, as per the instruction on node-red-node-test-helper README
• optional: add more dependencies to package.json
• run npm install under that node package directory

Also, if I npm install -g jest AFTER installing node-red globally, I get the same issue and have to reinstall node-red.

I also tried to wraps up the helper into a utility package without installing this package globally, and let all the other nodes share the utility code through require('/path/to/util'), and will get the same "missing node-red" problem with that utility package itself.

The only sure fix I can find is to add node-red as a dev-dependency to all custom node packages. But that seems a huge baggage to carry if we eventually have hundreds of nodes.

I must admit that I'm not 100% sure what I'm doing when installing npm dependencies, but I'd appreciate some pointers on what I'm missing.

[kakyoism]

Currently, I just have to write node-red as a dev-dependency in the package.json in a wrapper package, and completely forget about using a pre-installed node-red.