安装webpack来分离依赖项？

Question

Im going through a tutorial on webpack (third day and still confused as anything!) and Im combing through the commands:

npm i webpack --save-dev

The above command installs the webpack as a node module to '--save-dev'? Im confused what '--save-dev' is. And is it a normal convention for webpacks to use?

Also where is this dependency being saved? I dont find any reference to it in webpack.config.js or package.json for that matter?

Many thanks

Answer 1

npm i webpack --save-dev is a shorthand for npm install webpack --save-dev . The --save-dev flag tells npm to save the dependency as a development dependency , ie it will be listed in devDependencies in package.json instead of the "normal" dependencies section.

What this means is that development dependencies are dependencies that are not required to run your application, but only for development purposes like running unit tests, bundling the application, etc. etc.

From the documentation for npm install :

-D, --save-dev: Package will appear in your devDependencies.

Here is another stackoverflow post on differences between "normal" dependencies and development dependencies.

Cheers, Alex