Node gyp ERR - invalid mode: 'rU' while trying to load binding.gyp

This issue has been reported to node-gyp and was introduced on Python3.11. To solve it and keep using Python3.11 you can update your input.py file as the file 'rU' has been renamed to 'r' and that is why we see this error.

Location for the file: /Users/username/npm-versions/6.13.7/node_modules/node-gyp/gyp/pylib/gyp/input.py

Method to be updated: LoadOneBuildFile()

Method updated:

def LoadOneBuildFile(build_file_path, data, aux_data, includes, is_target, check): if build_file_path in data: return data[build_file_path] if os.path.exists(build_file_path): # Open the build file for read ('r') with universal-newlines mode ('U') # to make sure platform specific newlines ('\r\n' or '\r') are converted to '\n' # which otherwise will fail eval() if sys.platform == 'zos': # On z/OS, universal-newlines mode treats the file as an ascii file. But since # node-gyp produces ebcdic files, do not use that mode. build_file_contents = open(build_file_path, 'r').read() else: build_file_contents = open(build_file_path, 'r').read() # Here is the line you need to update. Instead of 'rU', update to only 'r' else: raise GypError("%s not found (cwd: %s)" % (build_file_path, os.getcwd())) 

First Solution: If the Python version is needed for NPM's sake then try,..

npm config set python /path/to/executable/python

i.e. npm config set python /opt/homebrew/bin/python3.10

If the PYTHON environment variable is set to the path of a Python executable, then that version will be used, if it is a compatible version.

Second Solution: Set NODE_GYP_FORCE_PYTHON environment variable.

# file: $HOME/.bash_profile NODE_GYP_FORCE_PYTHON=/path/to/executable/python # Example: # export NODE_GYP_FORCE_PYTHON=/opt/homebrew/bin/python3.10 

If you're using prebuild, update it to v12.0.0.

node-gyp versions older than v8.0.0 don't work with Python 3.11. In my case, I was using an old version of the prebuild library which depended on node-gyp v6.0.1.

If you're using a library that doesn't have a newer version that depends on node-gyp 8+ then you can tell npm to use a more recent version of node-gyp by adding it to "dependencies": or "devDependencies": (whichever the library that depends on node-gyp is) and then adding it to "overrides": in your package.json file:

 "devDependencies": { "node-gyp": "9.4.0" }, "overrides": { "prebuild": { "node-gyp": "$node-gyp" } }, 

Replace "prebuild" above with whatever library depends on node-gyp.

The overrides attribute was added in npm 8.3, so this requires Node 16.

I fixed that via the following steps:

1. brew install [email protected]
2. In the .zshrc I set export PYTHON=/opt/homebrew/bin/python3.10
3. Don't forget to run source ~/.zshrc after you change your .zshrc

If you don't mind removing python. I deleted Python from my system (Mac M1) and it fixed it. It is better to install python in virtual environments because one global installation can always have side effects on other projects. Refer to this article on how to delete python on a MacBook

If you want to keep your global python3 installation I recommend this answer above.

In summary, in your node_modules/node-gyp/gyp/pylib/gyp/input.py file there is such a line of code as below. (You can find this file by clicking on the final path printed in the error-trace in your terminal.)

Old code

 else: build_file_contents = open(build_file_path, 'rU').read() 

Since the 'rU' file read-mode is deprecated in python3 so you have to update that code to this. (Change rU to r)

New code

 else: build_file_contents = open(build_file_path, 'r').read() 

I didn't want to deal with all the complexities nor downgrade default Python, the following workaround panned out:

1. Install Miniconda
2. conda create -n py310 python=3.10
3. conda activate py310
4. yarn

I had the same issue when I installed python3.11. The solution is exporting the Python to be < 3.10.

Here is the command for Mac M1:

export PYTHON=/opt/homebrew/bin/python3.10 

This solution completely updates the node-gyp version and works regardless of your node version:

Linux Alpine (perhaps other distros):

find /usr/lib -type d -name "node-gyp" -exec sh -c 'cd "$(dirname "{}")" && npm i node-gyp@latest' \; 

Mac using nvm:

find ~/.nvm -type d -name "node-gyp" -exec sh -c 'cd "$(dirname "{}")" && npm i node-gyp@latest' \; 

basically find all the directories that have node-gyp for your current node installation and manually update the node-gyp version and all the nested dependencies.

On alpine linux I also got an error fatal error: vips/vips8: No such file or directory

So I had to install vips-dev

but when I rand apk add vips-dev I got an error:

ERROR: unable to select packages: libmount-2.38.1-r6: breaks: util-linux-dev-2.38.1-r7[libmount=2.38.1-r7] satisfies: glib-2.76.1-r1[so:libmount.so.1] 

to resolve this I ran

apk update apk add vips-dev 

And the vips-dev package installed this time

Now I can run yarn install with no errors!

Use this only once when install npm packages the first time.

npm install --python=/usr/bin/python2.7 

Change the python path if you are on windows or macos The next installs are going to work without passing the python path