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File Protocol

The file: protocol fetches a package from a local path. This can be useful for testing packages locally before publishing them to the npm registry, or distributing a particular dependency without relying on the version from the npm registry.

yarn add my-pkg@file:./relative/path/to/dependency/folder

Packing​

warning

Unlike git: dependencies, the folder pointed to by file: is not packed before being imported in the project. This is something we'll likely fix in a future major version.

When file: points to a folder, Yarn will copy it rather than directly reference its sources. For the node_modules linker, it means that the content of the generated node_modules will be unique files, and that changes performed there won't affect the original source folder.

file:./relative/path/to/package.tgz

When file: points to a .tgz file, Yarn will transparently let you require files from within the archive. For the node_modules linker, it means that the archive will be unpacked into the generated node_modules folder.