I’m having trouble with an npm warning that keeps appearing in my terminal. Can someone help me understand what’s going on?
I was working on my project and everything seemed fine. Then I tried running npm start in my VS Code terminal and got this message:
npm WARN config global `--global`, `--local` are deprecated. Use `--location=global` instead.
Debugger attached.
Unknown command: "start"
To see a list of supported npm commands, run:
npm help
This warning about deprecated flags is confusing me. I’m not sure why it’s showing up or how to make it go away. Is this something I need to fix in my npm configuration? Should I be worried about this affecting my project?
Any advice on how to handle this deprecation warning would be really helpful. Thanks!
This deprecation warning shows up when npm finds old --global or --local flags in your config or scripts. It won’t break anything, but you’re using outdated syntax. Check your .npmrc file in your project root or run npm config list to see if these deprecated flags are there. You can edit the .npmrc file directly or use npm config set commands with the new --location=global syntax instead. The “Unknown command: start” error is different - your package.json probably doesn’t have a start script in the scripts section, so npm doesn’t know what to do.
yep, that warning is just npm telling ya to update your flags. just do npm install -g npm@latest to get the latest version. as for the start error, make sure your project has a package.json with a start script in it. good luck!
I ran into this same warning recently. It’s triggered by old npm configs still sitting on your system. The warning itself is harmless - npm’s just telling you about syntax changes, but your commands still work fine. I fixed it by running npm config edit and deleting any lines with the old --global or --local flags. Also check if you’ve got global npm packages installed with older npm versions - they sometimes carry these deprecated settings. The start command issue is totally separate though - make sure your package.json has the scripts section set up correctly.