`npm build` doesn't run the script named “build” in package.json

Question

For a new module I'm trying to use npm build without gulp / Grunt / other specialised build tools.

"scripts": {
  "build": "node build.js"
},

My build.js is simply

console.log('Hello')

However, running

npm build

Simply exits without printing anything, with a status of 0.

Running:

npm install

Also does all the normal things, but does not run build.js either.

How can I make npm run my build script?

Edit: even simple bash commands don't seem to work, eg

"scripts": {
    "build": "touch TESTFILE"
},

Doesn't make a file with that name.

This is basically a huge and unintuitive annoyance of NPM and is one of the reasons I continue to use Yarn. With yarn, I can run any custom script just as a parameter i.e yarn storybook will run the storybook script. In NPM I have to do npm run storybook and on top of that, if I wish to pass any parameters through npm, it requires -- before it, so when comparing yarn storybook --ci to npm run storybook -- --ci, it's a no-brainer to me. — Emobe

jayphelps jayphelps · Accepted Answer · 2015-05-07T21:55:16

Unfortunately npm build is already an internal command, as described in the docs:

This is the plumbing command called by npm link and npm install. It should generally not be called directly.

Because that command already exists, it always shadows over your "build": "node build.js".

The fully-qualified way to run your own script is with run-script or its alias run:

$ npm run build

npm start and others are the short-hand way, but is only an option when an existing npm command doesn't shadow it, like npm build does.

For posterity (as others have mentioned) npm build is used by npm to build native C/C++ Node addons using node-gyp.