Inconsistency between prepare script documentation or behaviour

[rhys-vdw]

Documentation suggests a great concept:

NOTE: If a package being installed through git contains a prepare script, its dependencies and devDependencies will be installed, and the prepare script will be run, before the package is packaged and installed.

https://docs.npmjs.com/cli/v10/using-npm/scripts#life-cycle-scripts

However this is simply not the case. Here I have tried to use prepare to compile my package after install, and it fails:

https://github.com/rhys-vdw/lua-doc-extractor/blob/027b55260631949211dec6d0ce06878f7524613c/package.json#L13

$ npm install -g lua-doc-extractor@rhys-vdw/lua-doc-extractor#027b55260631949211dec6d0ce06878f7524613c
npm error code 1
npm error git dep preparation failed
npm error command C:\Users\rhysv\.nvm\versions\node\v22.11.0\bin\node.exe C:\Users\rhysv\.nvm\versions\node\v22.11.0\bin\node_modules\npm\bin\npm-cli.js install --force --cache=C:\Users\rhysv\AppData\Local\npm-cache --prefer-offline=false --prefer-online=false --offline=false --no-progress --no-save --no-audit --include=dev --include=peer --include=optional --no-package-lock-only --no-dry-run
npm error npm warn using --force Recommended protections disabled.
npm error npm error code 1
npm error npm error path C:\Users\rhysv\AppData\Local\npm-cache\_cacache\tmp\git-cloneXEnR89
npm error npm error command failed
npm error npm error command C:\WINDOWS\system32\cmd.exe /d /s /c npm run build
npm error npm error > lua-doc-extractor@0.0.1 build
npm error npm error > tsc --build
npm error npm error npm warn using --force Recommended protections disabled.
npm error npm error 'tsc' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
npm error npm error operable program or batch file.
npm error npm error A complete log of this run can be found in: C:\Users\rhysv\AppData\Local\npm-cache\_logs\2024-11-16T05_15_52_258Z-debug-0.log
npm error A complete log of this run can be found in: C:\Users\rhysv\AppData\Local\npm-cache\_logs\2024-11-16T05_15_51_411Z-debug-0.log

Here you can see that dev dependencies were not installed:

npm error npm error 'tsc' is not recognized as an internal or external command,

This suggests that the typescript dev dependency was not installed.

However if I run it locally with npm run prepare the build succeeds.