Confusing publish message about scoped repos

[slhck]

Description

I have a scoped package that I want to publish to a private registry. It uses the setting:

  "publishConfig": {
    "registry": "https://npmregistry.example.com"
  },

in the package.json. Also I have specified in .npmrc:

@example:registry=https://npmregistry.example.com

When I run np, I get asked:

This scoped repo @example/foo hasn't been published. Do you want to publish it publicly?

It is unclear to me what this does. I obviously do not want to publish it publicly – that's why I have specified a custom registry. I definitely do not want to publish it publicly… but I want to publish it anyway.

Steps to reproduce

1. Create a scoped package with the publishConfig specifying a registry
2. Run np

Expected behavior

I expected np to simply continue publishing the package to the private registry, as it does when you specify "No" to the above question:

? Select semver increment or specify new version major  1.0.0
? This scoped repo @example/foo hasn't been published. Do you want to publish it publicly? No

  ✔ Prerequisite check
  ✔ Git
  ↓ Cleanup [skipped]
  ✔ Installing dependencies using npm
  ✔ Running tests using npm
  ✔ Bumping version using npm
  ✔ Publishing package using npm
  ✔ Pushing tags

Perhaps this is just a misunderstanding of the features, but in that case, it might be helpful to document what this option does, and whether there is a flag to skip it?

Environment

np - 6.2.1
Node.js - 13.6.0
npm - 6.13.4

[sindresorhus]

I obviously do not want to publish it publicly – that's why I have specified a custom registry.

That prompt is really meant for scoped packages published against the public registry. I guess we don't have logic to handle case for scoped packages in a custom registry.

This is definitely a bug.

[slhck]

Thanks for the quick response. So if I understand you correctly, the solution would consist in checking whether a custom registry is defined and then simply ignoring this check?