Handling Import Aliases in Node.js ESM without NODE_PATH: A Practical Example

loader.mjs

import generateAliasesResolver from 'esm-module-alias';
import { glob } from 'glob';

// TODO Create an aliases map { '@dir/a': 'dist/@dir/a/index.js', '@dir/b': 'dist/@dir/b/index.js', ... }
const aliases = glob
  .sync('dist/@*/*/index.js', { cwd: import.meta.dirname })
  .reduce((a, jsfile) => {
    a[jsfile.substring(13, jsfile.length - 9)] = jsfile;
    return a;
  }, {});

export const resolve = generateAliasesResolver(aliases);

package.json

{
  "scripts": {
    "start": "NODE_ENV=development node --import=./register.mjs dist/server.js"
  }
}

register.mjs

import { register } from 'node:module';
import { pathToFileURL } from 'node:url';

register('./loader.mjs', pathToFileURL('./'));