npm create vite@latest prompts syntax errors with internal module imports

[soulstar205]

While trying to install vite build using npm create vite@latest, after installing vite globally. I keep getting an error SyntaxError: Cannot use import statement outside a module.
This is the full error statement. ```C:\Users\Travelmania\AppData\Local\npm-cache_npx\53b8fd318f0d6c47\node_modules\create-vite\index.js:3
import './dist/index.mjs'
^^^^^^

SyntaxError: Cannot use import statement outside a module
at Module._compile (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:891:18)
at Object.Module._extensions..js (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:991:10)
at Module.load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:811:32)
at Function.Module._load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:723:14)
at Function.Module.runMain (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:1043:10)
at internal/main/run_main_module.js:17:11I have tried everything I know, I added"type": "module"``` to the the package.json, nothing seems to work.
I then forked a vite template from github, npm install works, but when I run dev or start, I get this ES6 incompatibility error as well.

^^^^^^

SyntaxError: Cannot use import statement outside a module
    at Module._compile (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:891:18)
    at Object.Module._extensions..js (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:991:10)
    at Module.load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:811:32)
    at Function.Module._load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:723:14)
    at Function.Module.runMain (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:1043:10)
    at internal/main/run_main_module.js:17:11```.
I would really appreciate any help I can get here. Thanks.

[sadn1ck]

does it still happen if you uninstall vite globally? try uninstalling and see. don't have access to a windows machine unfortunately

[soulstar205]

I have done all of that. I went as far as uninstalling node, npm, nvm, global node modules, and reinstalling everything just in case some cached code was causing the trouble. I now find that this issue extends to nearly all the frameworks built on top of react, like Next, and Remix. I would really appreciate any info that solves this problem. However, plain react works just fine.

[JosephCatrambone]

Stumbled upon this via Google and wanted to help out future people: Given your user path, it seems likely you're on Windows.

I seeing the same, and while I haven't dug into it in the depths, a fairly old version of Node was making its way into the executable path before Nodist. You can see this if you run the following:

PS E:\WebProjects> nodist
  (x64)
  11.13.0
> 22.14.0  (global: latest)
PS E:\WebProjects> node --version
v11.13.0

In specific "C:\Program Files (x86)\Nodist\bin" was (correctly) on my path, but had a very outdated version of node next to it that didn't get removed with an uninstall. I'd recommend looking at your system path and environment variables to try and trace down the oldest version if you see it.

EDIT: Update. It seems that nodist, when installed with chocolatey as I did, will default to installing 11. You can do nodist - 11 and nodist + 22 to change your default node version to something more recent.