generator.run is not a function

[Vladyslav317]

Type of issue

Bug report

My environment

• OS version/details: macOS 14.4.1
• Node version: 20.10.0 (run node --version in your terminal)
• npm version: 10.2.3 (run npm --version in your terminal)
• Version of yo : 5.0.0 (run yo --version in your terminal)

Expected behavior

Should proceed with generating a project by adding src folder

Current behavior

generator.run is not a function

Steps to reproduce the behavior

yo the name of the generator

Command line output

generator.run is not a function

[szm1002]

+1

[yenoh2]

I worked through detailed debugging to understand how to write a generator that works with the latest yeoman yo and generator. At this point none of the Yeoman documentation describes how to build a working generator with the latest version. Here's a fully functioning example that uses the latest version of yeoman and the yeoman generator: https://github.com/yenoh2/generator-hac-tf-module

update your package.json adding "type": "module"
Since the newer version uses ESM you need to update your generator use imports instead of 'require' in your index.js file.
Example:
import _ from 'lodash';
import Generator from 'yeoman-generator';
import askName from 'inquirer-npm-name';
import { createRequire } from 'module';
const require = createRequire(import.meta.url);
// see full example here: https://github.com/yenoh2/generator-hac-tf-module/blob/master/generators/app/index.js
Your export for your extended generator should look like this:
export default class extends Generator {

[JoshuaKGoldberg]

Duplicate of #796. This is a result of using outdated dependencies, in particular yeoman-generator. #802 has a compatibility table and tracks adding that to docs.

If anybody is still getting this on the latest dependencies, please do post an issue with a full reproduction that shows the issue (https://antfu.me/posts/why-reproductions-are-required). It's possible there are bugs and/or outdated pieces of documentation that should be fixed. Cheers! 🎩

[ntt77]

same issue. and I can't use other way because SharePoint is required to use this

[TamaMcGlinn]

If anybody is still getting this on the latest dependencies, please do post an issue with a full reproduction

For me, the reproduction is;

1. Find out about Yeoman, click "Getting started"
2. npm install -g yo
3. npm install -g generator-webapp
4. yo webapp

I.e. do exactly what the yeoman website tells me to do.

OS version/details: Ubuntu 22.04
Node version: 20.13.1 (run node --version in your terminal)
npm version: 10.5.2 (run npm --version in your terminal)
Version of yo : 5.1.0 (run yo --version in your terminal)

So, according to the table in #802 this should be fine; I have node >= 20.5.0 as required by yeoman 5.1.

[JoshuaKGoldberg]

I reproduce this with the old version of yo, 5.x:

$ yo --version
5.1.0

$ yo generator-webapp
...
generator.run is not a function

Full output from running the reproduction commands

npm i -g yo
npm warn deprecated npmlog@2.0.4: This package is no longer supported.
npm warn deprecated are-we-there-yet@1.1.7: This package is no longer supported.
npm warn deprecated gauge@1.2.7: This package is no longer supported.
npm warn deprecated boolean@3.2.0: Package no longer supported. Contact Support at https://www.npmjs.com/support for more info.

added 768 packages in 17s

133 packages are looking for funding
  run `npm fund` for details
npm i -g generator-webapp
npm warn deprecated inflight@1.0.6: This module is not supported, and leaks memory. Do not use it. Check out lru-cache if you want a good and tested way to coalesce async requests by a key value, which is much more comprehensive and powerful.
npm warn deprecated source-map-url@0.4.1: See https://github.com/lydell/source-map-url#deprecated
npm warn deprecated rimraf@2.7.1: Rimraf versions prior to v4 are no longer supported
npm warn deprecated urix@0.1.0: Please see https://github.com/lydell/urix#deprecated
npm warn deprecated rimraf@3.0.2: Rimraf versions prior to v4 are no longer supported
npm warn deprecated resolve-url@0.2.1: https://github.com/lydell/resolve-url#deprecated
npm warn deprecated glob@7.2.3: Glob versions prior to v9 are no longer supported
npm warn deprecated generator-mocha@2.0.4: This package is deprecated. See: https://github.com/yeoman/yeoman/issues/1779
npm warn deprecated glob@6.0.4: Glob versions prior to v9 are no longer supported
npm warn deprecated glob@6.0.4: Glob versions prior to v9 are no longer supported
npm warn deprecated source-map-resolve@0.5.3: See https://github.com/lydell/source-map-resolve#deprecated
npm warn deprecated generator-jasmine@2.0.1: This package is deprecated. See: https://github.com/yeoman/yeoman/issues/1779

added 533 packages in 6s

30 packages are looking for funding
  run `npm fund` for details
yo webapp
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'cat' of module exports inside circular dependency
(Use `node --trace-warnings ...` to show where the warning was created)
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'cd' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'chmod' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'cp' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'dirs' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'pushd' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'popd' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'echo' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'tempdir' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'pwd' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'exec' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'ls' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'find' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'grep' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'head' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'ln' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'mkdir' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'rm' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'mv' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'sed' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'set' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'sort' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'tail' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'test' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'to' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'toEnd' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'touch' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'uniq' of module exports inside circular dependency
(node:3080) Warning: Accessing non-existent property 'which' of module exports inside circular dependency
Error webapp 

generator.run is not a function

However, running with yo@6 -which is still in beta and marked as next on npm- no longer shows the crash.

$ npx yo@next generator-webapp
...
     _-----_     ╭──────────────────────────╮
    |       |    │  'Allo 'allo! Out of the │
    |--(o)--|    │    box I include HTML5   │
   `---------´   │ Boilerplate, jQuery, and │
    ( _´U`_ )    │ a gulpfile to build your │
    /___A___\   /│           app.           │
     |  ~  |     ╰──────────────────────────╯
   __'.___.'__   
 ´   `  |° ´ Y ` 

? Which additional features would you like to include?
...

The v6 release is tracked by #882.

Closing this issue out as resolved. To anybody still seeing this: please try yo@next to run yo v6 instead of v5. And do post back / file a new issue if there's something broken in the next version of yo. Cheers! 🎩