Electron Packager 18.1.2 breaks electron-forge

[benbucksch]

Pre-flight checklist

• I have searched the issue tracker for a bug that matches the one I want to file, without success.

Electron Forge version

7.2.0

Electron version

28.0.0

Operating system

Ubuntu 20.04 x64

Last known working Electron Forge version

7.2.0 (Same)

Expected behavior

• Electron starts

Actual behavior

$ electron-forge start

An unhandled exception has occurred inside Forge:
Cannot find module '@electron/packager/src/targets'
Require stack:
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/util/parse-archs.js
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/api/make.js
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/api/index.js
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/cli/dist/util/check-system.js
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/cli/dist/electron-forge.js
Error: Cannot find module '@electron/packager/src/targets'
Require stack:
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/util/parse-archs.js
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/api/make.js
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/api/index.js
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/cli/dist/util/check-system.js
- .../node_modules/@electron-forge/cli/dist/electron-forge.js
    at Module._resolveFilename (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1075:15)
    at Module._load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:920:27)
    at Module.require (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1141:19)
    at require (node:internal/modules/cjs/helpers:110:18)
    at Object.<anonymous> (.../node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/util/parse-archs.js:5:51)
    at Module._compile (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1254:14)
    at Module._extensions..js (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1308:10)
    at Module.load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1117:32)
    at Module._load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:958:12)
    at Module.require (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1141:19)
error Command failed with exit code 1.

Steps to reproduce

1. Create a simple electron app using electron-forge
2. yarn install
3. yarn start

Additional information

When I downgrade using yarn add @electron/[email protected] and do yarn start, Electron starts. When I upgrade again using yarn add @electron/[email protected] and do yarn start, the above problem appears.

• With 18.1.1, ls node_modules/\@electron/packager/src/targers.js shows that the file exists.
• With 18.1.2, ls node_modules/\@electron/packager/ shows that the src/ directory no longer exists and was replaced by dist/.

The release notes of Electron Packager only mention documentation changes. But it appears the entire TypeScript rewrite #1593 was shipped crediting as "update broken doc link".

Fixes

Work with Electron Packager (issue #1673) to create a stable export in electron/packager for Electron Forge to use.

[benbucksch]

Fixed by #3419. Thanks @erikian!

Leaving this open until this is released, given that everybody is broken right now.

[FrostMiKu]

Sorry, how can I start a new project now?

[erikian]

@FrostMiKu as a workaround, you can use Yarn's resolutions or npm's overrides in your package.json to use a previous Packager version until a new Forge version is released:

Yarn:

{
  "resolutions": {
    "@electron/packager": "18.1.1"
  }
}

npm:

{
  "overrides": {
    "@electron/packager": "18.1.1"
  }
}

[erikian]

Fixed by electron/packager#1641, create-electron-app should run as expected now. If it's still not working, you can uninstall create-electron-app (yarn global remove create-electron-app / npm uninstall -g create-electron-app) and then run yarn create electron-app / npx create-electron-app again.

[JasonLeviGoodison]

Are you sure the new version of electron-forge is published? I could be mistaken, but I still see 18.1.2 in package.json and when I run:
npx create-electron-app new-app

I still get the error:

node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1051
  throw err;
  ^

Error: Cannot find module '@electron/packager/src/targets'
Require stack:
- /Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/util/parse-archs.js
- /Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/api/make.js
- /Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/api/index.js
- /Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/@electron-forge/cli/dist/electron-forge-init.js
- /Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/create-electron-app/dist/index.js
    at Module._resolveFilename (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1048:15)
    at Module._load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:901:27)
    at Module.require (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1115:19)
    at require (node:internal/modules/helpers:119:18)
    at Object.<anonymous> (/Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/util/parse-archs.js:5:51)
    at Module._compile (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1233:14)
    at Module._extensions..js (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1287:10)
    at Module.load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1091:32)
    at Module._load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:938:12)
    at Module.require (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1115:19) {
  code: 'MODULE_NOT_FOUND',
  requireStack: [
    '/Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/util/parse-archs.js',
    '/Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/api/make.js',
    '/Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/@electron-forge/core/dist/api/index.js',
    '/Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/@electron-forge/cli/dist/electron-forge-init.js',
    '/Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc/node_modules/create-electron-app/dist/index.js'
  ]
}

Node.js v20.4.0
npm ERR! code 1
npm ERR! path /Users/jasongoodison/Documents/dev
npm ERR! command failed
npm ERR! command sh -c create-electron-app lawyer-screencap --template=webpack

npm ERR! A complete log of this run can be found in: /Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_logs/2023-12-19T19_07_21_001Z-debug-0.log

Am I missing something?

[benbucksch]

@JasonLeviGoodison There was no release yet. Last release of electron-forge was 7.2.0, released 3 weeks ago.
@erikian Could you please make an emergency release?

[erikian]

Are you sure the new version of electron-forge is published

@JasonLeviGoodison we released a new version of Packager containing the missing file that Forge needs, so there's no new Forge version right now since Packager v18.1.3 should be enough to make create-electron-app work again.

Have you tried npm uninstall -g create-electron-app before running npx create-electron-app new-app? Reinstalling create-electron-app should force npm to use the latest Packager version.

[JasonLeviGoodison]

No, even after global uninstall it doesn't work. This isn't exactly my wheelhouse, but isnt that expected?
npx should be using the latest in npm registry if I'm understanding its use correctly.

My understanding is that this repo needs to update its version of packager, which is currently 18.1.2, but should be 18.1.3 (unless you also released a hotfix on 18.1.2).

Im not 100% sure how create-electron-app works vs npm init electron-app@latest, but it feels like they should both work out of box to me. I've uninstalled all global versions of electron and electron forge, and also am using npx to make sure im using up-to-date packages

[erikian]

This might sound weird, but do you have Yarn installed on your machine? I think there's an open issue where create-electron-app always uses Yarn internally if it's available, even if you run it with npx (#3164).

If you do, try running yarn global remove create-electron-app, then yarn create electron-app new-app to see if it makes a difference.

I've uninstalled all global versions of electron and electron forge

Just in case you've reinstalled them, it's a good idea to uninstall any global versions of both Electron and Forge (and pretty much anything else from the Electron org 😄), as they can cause some weird conflicts. They are meant to be installed at the project-level, not globally.

npx should be using the latest in npm registry if I'm understanding its use correctly

That's correct. Forge specifies "@electron/packager": "^18.1.2" in its package.json, which means that any clean installs will use the most recent version in the 18.x.y series (18.1.3). If all else fails, you can manually delete the /Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc directory (or whatever path you're getting in your error message), this should force a clean install.

[JasonLeviGoodison]

Thank you so much for your help! The yarn commands change didn't work, but just manually deleting /Users/jasongoodison/.npm/_npx/35c48adf706267bc seemed to do the trick.

Just for the record, I definitely wasn't going to keep a global install around ahah 😅 I just tried a lot of random stuff last night when having this problem in hope that something would fix it.

Good to go now!