WSL v1 - npm crashes at installing grpc

Question

I'm using WSL v.1 and I'm trying to start locally the DataTurks ' frontend bazaar app which is React based. So I basically type npm install but I run into an error when the npm reaches the library grpc and the error provided is:

path /home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/grpc-2c7a1feb/node_modules/mkdirp
npm ERR! code EACCES
npm ERR! errno -13
npm ERR! syscall rename
npm ERR! Error: EACCES: permission denied, rename '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/grpc-2c7a1feb/node_modules/mkdirp' -> '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/mkdirp-97188a16'
npm ERR!  { Error: EACCES: permission denied, rename '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/grpc-2c7a1feb/node_modules/mkdirp' -> '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/mkdirp-97188a16'
npm ERR!   cause:
npm ERR!    { Error: EACCES: permission denied, rename '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/grpc-2c7a1feb/node_modules/mkdirp' -> '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/mkdirp-97188a16'
npm ERR!      errno: -13,
npm ERR!      code: 'EACCES',
npm ERR!      syscall: 'rename',
npm ERR!      path: '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/grpc-2c7a1feb/node_modules/mkdirp',
npm ERR!      dest: '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/mkdirp-97188a16' },
npm ERR!   stack: 'Error: EACCES: permission denied, rename \'/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/grpc-2c7a1feb/node_modules/mkdirp\' -> \'/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/mkdirp-97188a16\'',
npm ERR!   errno: -13,
npm ERR!   code: 'EACCES',
npm ERR!   syscall: 'rename',
npm ERR!   path: '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/grpc-2c7a1feb/node_modules/mkdirp',
npm ERR!   dest: '/home/kmartin62/DataTurks/bazaar/node_modules/.staging/mkdirp-97188a16',
npm ERR!   parent: '@firebase/firestore' }
npm ERR!
npm ERR! Please try running this command again as root/Administrator.

I tried to install it as a super-user, sudo but the error keeps flashing. I even installed grpc with -g option ahead, for a global install, but when I run npm install after this it crashes again.

Has anyone experienced this or does anyone know how to solve it?

Answer 1

This is an instance of one of the oldest bugs in WSL v1, impacting many different npm packages: https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/14 . I also use WSL for development and I resolved the problem by switching to WSL v2.