Clean AND practical way to handle node_modules in a Dockerized Node.js dev environment?

node.js docker docker-compose node-modules

I would suggest to look at this project https://github.com/BretFisher/node-docker-good-defaults, it supports both local and container node_modules by using a trick, but is not compatible with some frameworks (eg strapi):

The container node_modules are placed one folder level up from the app (node's algo to resolve deps, recursively looks for up the folder of the app for the node_modules), and they are removed from the app folder
The host node_modules are placed inside the app folder (no changes there)
You extra bind-mount the package.json + lock files specifically between the container (remember up one folder from app) to host (app folder) so they are always kept in sync => So when you docker exec npm install dep, you only need to npm install dep on host and eventually rebuild your docker image.

CodeHunter