"npm install bootstrap@latest" now installs v4 alpha instead of 3.3.6

[arechsteiner]

With npm, using

npm install bootstrap --save causes "bootstrap": "~4.0.0-alpha.2" being installed and added as a dependency to package.json.

In bower on the other hand, bower install bootstrap --save installs and saves the latest stable version (3.3.6), as expected.

[cvrebert]

Unable to reproduce.

dummy $ npm -v
3.3.12
dummy $ npm install bootstrap
/Users/chris/code/dummy
└── bootstrap@3.3.6 

dummy $

[danielweck]

I had the same problem (see #18539 )

npm view bootstrap dist-tags (alternatively npm dist-tag ls bootstrap) shows { latest: '4.0.0-alpha.2' }
I'm pretty sure "latest" should reference the stable version 3.x (Git master branch), not 4.x which is a pre-release (branch v4-dev) Don't you think?

That's how other NPM libs do it, e.g. jQuery:

$ npm view jquery dist-tags

{ beta: '3.0.0-alpha1',
  latest: '2.1.4',
  old: '1.9.1',
  compat: '1.11.3' }

[danielweck]

See NPM documentation: https://docs.npmjs.com/cli/dist-tag
"latest" should be used for current v3 version, "alpha" or "beta" for v4

[cvrebert]

Wow, the npm docs don't surface this too well. And googling for "npm prerelease" didn't seem to yield anything mentioning dist-tags either.

[cvrebert]

@danielweck Still confused why you were getting v4 though. The webpages I had found regarding prereleases claim that npm install <packagename> skips prereleases (such as our alphas). Did you use some different installation command?

[cvrebert]

The dist-tags should be sorted out now:

$ npm view bootstrap dist-tags
{ latest: '3.3.6', next: '4.0.0-alpha.2' }

[danielweck]

@cvrebert I am not sure about the original issue committer ( @arechsteiner ), but personally I was using npm install bootstrap@latest which explains why v4 was pulled instead of v3. Thanks for fixing the dist-tags :)

[arechsteiner]

@danielweck: I am using npm install bootstrap, without the @latest.

@cvrebert: This works now, and npm view dist-tags bootstrap shows { latest: '3.3.6', next: '4.0.0-alpha.2' }. 3.3.6 is installed as expected.

[cvrebert]

Proposed related improvements to npm's documentation.

• npm-dist-tag docs: Explain why the latest tag matters npm/npm#10787
• https://github.com/npm/docs/issues/486
• Link to tag docs in docs for npm publish --tag npm/npm#10788
• Gloss 1st prose mention of "tag" in npm install docs npm/npm#10789
• Clarify that npm install foo ≡ npm install foo@latest by default npm/npm#10790

[cvrebert]

And I've just sent a PR to update our internal npm release instructions accordingly, so this should be fully resolved now.
@danielweck Thank you for the dist-tags pointer.

[boennemann]

@cvrebert I really appreciate your documentation efforts for dist-tags. I did a full write-up on dist-tags recently: https://medium.com/greenkeeper-blog/one-simple-trick-for-javascript-package-maintainers-to-avoid-breaking-their-user-s-software-and-to-6edf06dc5617
Using this technique you might be able to avoid the confusion around prerelease versions altogether.