ngcc clashes with pnpm

When using pnpm as a package manager, ng build (or serve) causes application errors on the first run. Running ng build (or serve) a second time fixes the issues.

This process can cause a few different types of application errors, it is hard to pin down. Check the repro for a reproduction of Cannot read property 'bindingStartIndex' of null error.

Other errors caused:

• Does not have ‘ɵmod’ property (application)
• Tried to overwrite (…)__ivy_ngcc_bak with an ngcc back up file, which is disallowed (build)

I suspect this is because ngcc manipulates the node_modules folder in a way that is incompatible with pnpm.

Suggestions:

• keep node_modules readonly.
• custom location for ngcc output (would be great for CI pipeline build caching).

[JoostK]

Heya, using pnpm is not supported (see #32087) and I’m somewhat surprised that it even works to some extend.

ngcc exists to bridge the gap between ViewEngine libraries and Ivy’s compilation output. We are working towards making the core packages be published in native Ivy format starting from v13 and there are no plans to revisit how ngcc works to make it compatible with tools like pnpm (and Yarn P’n’P etc.) per Alex’s comment in https://github.com/angular/angular/issues/32087#issuecomment-523225437.

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