Dfyjkt

Let's say we have a .env file with some variables specified:

AWS_PROFILE=hsz
ENVIRONMENT=development

There is also a simple npm task defined:

 "name": "project",
 "version": "0.0.1",
 "scripts": 
 "deploy": "sls deploy"
 

But runnning npm run deploy ignores our .env definition.

It can be resolved with better-npm-run like:

 "name": "project",
 "version": "0.0.2",
 "scripts": 
 "deploy": "bnr deploy"
 ,
 "betterScripts": 
 "deploy": "sls deploy"
 ,
 "devDependencies": 
 "better-npm-run": "^0.1.1",
 

but this looks like an overhead - especially when we have 10+ tasks.

Is there a better way to always load .env without proxying all tasks via better-npm-run?

A bit ugly, but you could try something like this:

"scripts": 
 "deploy": "export $(cat .env 

This will export all environment variables from the .env file before running sls deploy.

There are some variations to this tehnique in this answer.

Not very clean but it avoids usage of an extra module.

Maintain and load all your environment specific configuration in project itself.

dev.js

module.exports = 
 "host":"dev.com"

prod.js

module.exports = 
 "host":"prod.com"

config.js - main file that will resolve configuration based on process.env.ENV variable.

const dev = require('./dev');
const prod = require('./prod');
let envObject = ;
const env = process.env.ENV || "dev";
switch(env) 
 case 'prod':
 envObject = prod;
 break;
 default:
 envObject = dev;

envObject['ENV'] = env;
process.env = Object.assign(process.env,envObject); // Optional if you prefer to add them into process environment otherwise `require('./config')` where you need configuration. 
module.exports = envObject;

index.js - node project root file call every time when project start

const config = require('./config');
console.log('config object => ',config.host);

package.json

 "name": "project",
 "version": "0.0.2",
 "scripts": 
 "deploy": "sls deploy"
 

Running you node.js code
Prod environment ENV=prod npm run deploy;
Development environment - npm run deploy;

Default environment is set to dev in ./config.js

Using this simple practice you don't need any npm module to manage your environment configurations.