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Manifest

A manifest is the metadata file that describes your package to the package manager and registry — its name, version, entry point, dependencies, scripts, and more. In Node, this is always package.json.

Common manifest fields

FieldExamplePurpose
name"express"Package name (used in require() / import)
version"4.18.2"Semver version
type"module" or "commonjs"Module system
main / exports"./dist/index.js"Entry point(s)
scripts{ "start": "node app.js" }Runable commands
dependencies{ "express": "^4.18.0" }Production deps
devDependencies{ "vitest": "^1.0.0" }Dev-only deps
peerDependencies{ "react": "^18.0.0" }Expected host deps
optionalDependencies{ "bufferutil": "^4.0.0" }Non-failing deps
engines{ "node": ">=20" }Runtime requirement

Example

{
  "name": "my-app",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "private": true,
  "type": "module",
  "scripts": {
    "start": "node app.js",
    "test": "vitest"
  },
  "dependencies": {
    "express": "^4.18.0"
  },
  "devDependencies": {
    "vitest": "^1.0.0"
  }
}

vlt.json

vlt also supports its own configuration file (vlt.json) for workspace configuration, catalogs, and graph modifiers. For more details, see Configuring vlt.

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