Node.js process.release Property

The process.release property in Node.js provides information about the current Node.js release, including version-related metadata and source URLs. It is mainly used to access details about the Node.js build and release environment during runtime. Its key features are:

• Provides information about the current Node.js release.
• Contains source code and header file URLs.
• Useful for debugging and runtime environment inspection.

Syntax

process.release

Return Value: This property returns an object containing the metadata of current release of nodejs.

This object will contain properties like:

• name: The value of name will always be 'node' in Node.js. Its value can be 'io.js' for legacy io.js release.
• sourceUrl: It contains a string representing the absolute URL pointing to the current release sourcecode as '.tar.gz' file.
• headersUrl: It contains a string representing absolute URL pointing to the current release source header files as '.tar.gz' file. This file is smaller than source code file and can be used for compiling Node.js native addons.
• libUrl: It contains a string representing absolute URL pointing to 'node.lib' file matching the architecture and version of the current release. This file is used to compile Node.js native addons. This property only available in windows builds, may be missing on other platform.
• lts: A string literals representing latest stable release. Its value can be one of these: 
  
  • Argon:for the 4.x.x LTS versions
  • Boron:for the 6.x.x LTS versions
  • Carbon:for the 8.x.x LTS versions
  • Dubnium:for the 10.x.x LTS versions

Use Cases of process.release

• Downloading matching Node.js source or header files for native addon compilation.
• Detecting whether the current Node.js version is an LTS release.
• Verifying platform-specific build resources such as node.lib on Windows.

Example 1:

Output:

{ name: 'node',
 lts: 'Dubnium',
 sourceUrl:
 'https://nodejs.org/download/release/v10.16.0/node-v10.16.0.tar.gz',
 headersUrl:
 'https://nodejs.org/download/release/v10.16.0/node-v10.16.0-headers.tar.gz',
 libUrl:
 'https://nodejs.org/download/release/v10.16.0/win-x64/node.lib' }

Example 2:

Output:

name: node
lts: Dubnium
sourceUrl: https://nodejs.org/download/release/v10.16.0/node-v10.16.0.tar.gz
headersUrl: https://nodejs.org/download/release/v10.16.0/node-v10.16.0-headers.tar.gz
libUrl: https://nodejs.org/download/release/v10.16.0/win-x64/node.lib
Total no of attribute available = 5

Example 3:

Output:

lts: Dubnium
source url: https://nodejs.org/download/release/v10.16.0/node-v10.16.0.tar.gz
header url: https://nodejs.org/download/release/v10.16.0/node-v10.16.0-headers.tar.gz

Note: The above program will compile and run by using the node filename.js command.

Reference:https://nodejs.org/api/process.html#process_process_release