I am a total newbie to JS. I would like to use fetch with VSCode but totally unable to import it.

When I use: import fetch from "node-fetch";

I have the following error:

(node:19856) Warning: To load an ES module, set "type": "module" in the package.json or use the .mjs extension.
(Use `node --trace-warnings ...` to show where the warning was created)
c:\Users\myname\Documents\myproject\my_fetch_program.js:6
import fetch from "node-fetch";
^^^^^^

SyntaxError: Cannot use import statement outside a module
    at wrapSafe (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:984:16)
    at Module._compile (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:1032:27)
    at Object.Module._extensions..js (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:1097:10)
    at Module.load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:933:32)
    at Function.Module._load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:774:14)
    at Function.executeUserEntryPoint [as runMain] (internal/modules/run_main.js:72:12)
    at internal/main/run_main_module.js:17:47

[Done] exited with code=1 in 0.325 seconds

import fetch from "node_modules/node-fetch"; does not work either ...

I don't understand this error, because, in package.json, the type is already set to module...

node_modules/node-fetch/package.json

{
  "_from": "node-fetch",
  "_id": "[email protected]",
  "_inBundle": false,
  "_integrity": "sha512-bKMI C7/T/SPU1lKnbQbwxptpCrG9ashG VkytmXCPZyuM9jB6VU hY0oi4lC8LxTtAeWdckNCTa3nrGsAdA3Q==",
  "_location": "/node-fetch",
  "_phantomChildren": {},
  "_requested": {
    "type": "tag",
    "registry": true,
    "raw": "node-fetch",
    "name": "node-fetch",
    "escapedName": "node-fetch",
    "rawSpec": "",
    "saveSpec": null,
    "fetchSpec": "latest"
  },
  "_requiredBy": [
    "#USER",
    "/"
  ],
  "_resolved": "https://registry.npmjs.org/node-fetch/-/node-fetch-3.0.0.tgz",
  "_shasum": "79da7146a520036f2c5f644e4a26095f17e411ea",
  "_spec": "node-fetch",
  "_where": "C:\\Users\\myname\\Documents\\myproject",
  "author": {
    "name": "David Frank"
  },
  "bugs": {
    "url": "https://github.com/node-fetch/node-fetch/issues"
  },
  "bundleDependencies": false,
  "dependencies": {
    "data-uri-to-buffer": "^3.0.1",
    "fetch-blob": "^3.1.2"
  },
  "deprecated": false,
  "description": "A light-weight module that brings Fetch API to node.js",
  "devDependencies": {
    "abort-controller": "^3.0.0",
    "abortcontroller-polyfill": "^1.7.1",
    "busboy": "^0.3.1",
    "c8": "^7.7.2",
    "chai": "^4.3.4",
    "chai-as-promised": "^7.1.1",
    "chai-iterator": "^3.0.2",
    "chai-string": "^1.5.0",
    "coveralls": "^3.1.0",
    "delay": "^5.0.0",
    "form-data": "^4.0.0",
    "formdata-node": "^3.5.4",
    "mocha": "^8.3.2",
    "p-timeout": "^5.0.0",
    "tsd": "^0.14.0",
    "xo": "^0.39.1"
  },
  "engines": {
    "node": "^12.20.0 || ^14.13.1 || >=16.0.0"
  },
  "files": [
    "src",
    "@types/index.d.ts"
  ],
  "funding": {
    "type": "opencollective",
    "url": "https://opencollective.com/node-fetch"
  },
  "homepage": "https://github.com/node-fetch/node-fetch",
  "keywords": [
    "fetch",
    "http",
    "promise",
    "request",
    "curl",
    "wget",
    "xhr",
    "whatwg"
  ],
  "license": "MIT",
  "main": "./src/index.js",
  "name": "node-fetch",
  "repository": {
    "type": "git",
    "url": "git https://github.com/node-fetch/node-fetch.git"
  },
  "runkitExampleFilename": "example.js",
  "scripts": {
    "coverage": "c8 report --reporter=text-lcov | coveralls",
    "lint": "xo",
    "test": "mocha",
    "test-types": "tsd"
  },
  "sideEffects": false,
  "tsd": {
    "cwd": "@types",
    "compilerOptions": {
      "esModuleInterop": true
    }
  },
  "type": "module",
  "types": "./@types/index.d.ts",
  "version": "3.0.0",
  "xo": {
    "envs": [
      "node",
      "browser"
    ],
    "ignores": [
      "example.js"
    ],
    "rules": {
      "complexity": 0,
      "import/extensions": 0,
      "import/no-useless-path-segments": 0,
      "import/no-anonymous-default-export": 0,
      "import/no-named-as-default": 0,
      "unicorn/import-index": 0,
      "unicorn/no-array-reduce": 0,
      "unicorn/prefer-node-protocol": 0,
      "unicorn/numeric-separators-style": 0,
      "unicorn/explicit-length-check": 0,
      "capitalized-comments": 0,
      "@typescript-eslint/member-ordering": 0
    },
    "overrides": [
      {
        "files": "test/**/*.js",
        "envs": [
          "node",
          "mocha"
        ],
        "rules": {
          "max-nested-callbacks": 0,
          "no-unused-expressions": 0,
          "no-warning-comments": 0,
          "new-cap": 0,
          "guard-for-in": 0,
          "unicorn/no-array-for-each": 0,
          "unicorn/prevent-abbreviations": 0,
          "promise/prefer-await-to-then": 0,
          "ava/no-import-test-files": 0
        }
      }
    ]
  }
}

EDIT Version of Node: v14.17.0

CodePudding user response：

The advice the warning message is giving refers to the package.json of your code as opposed to the package.json for the fetch library. If you don't already have a package.json at the root of your project (that is ./package.json instead of ./node_modules/node-fetch/package.json) you will need to create one. If you already have a ./package.json file or once you have created one you just need to add the line:

"type": "module"

This will allow you to use the ES6 import statements. Full documentation is available if you would like to read further.