Node.js devs, imagine npm doesn’t exist. Instead, if you’re nice, you make a list of your dependencies in your README and everyone installs them manually. (Seriously.) Also, you can list names any way you like. So, if a library is called libclutter-1.0-dev, list it as clutter, libclutter, clutter-1.0, … and people will magically know you meant libclutter-1.0-dev (or, more likely, they’ll do an, e.g., apt search clutter to try and find out wtf you meant). Welcome to C/Vala development in 2021.

🤷‍♂️

(Oh, and every library you install is essentially a global install that is shared with every project you’re trying to build. So basically everything is ~ an npm install --global.)

This is really something an operating system like elementary OS has to tackle for its apps at least if it wants to attract developers (even if, say, the GNOME, etc., folks are happy with the status quo and/or enjoy the right of passage it represents for keeping out the hoi polloi).