[BUG] Inconsistent --silent for npm install

[Ninroot]

Is there an existing issue for this?

• I have searched the existing issues

This issue exists in the latest npm version

• I am using the latest npm

Current Behavior

When running npm install with json and silent options the result are inconsistent.

json + silent options when the package does not exist removes the logs such as npm ERR! code E404 + prints the JSON as expected 👍

npm install --json --silent shouldnotexistforthatexample      
{
  "error": {
    "code": "E404",
    "summary": "Not Found - GET https://registry.npmjs.org/shouldnotexistforthatexample - Not found",
    "detail": "\n 'shouldnotexistforthatexample@*' is not in this registry.\n\nNote that you can also install from a\ntarball, folder, http url, or git url."
  }
}

json options when the package exists prints the JSON as expected 👍

npm install --json chalk         
{
  "added": 0,
  "removed": 0,
  "changed": 0,
  "audited": 954,
  "funding": 186,
  "audit": {
    "vulnerabilities": {
      "info": 0,
      "low": 0,
      "moderate": 1,
      "high": 1,
      "critical": 0,
      "total": 2
    },
    "dependencies": {
      "prod": 199,
      "dev": 751,
      "optional": 5,
      "peer": 48,
      "peerOptional": 0,
      "total": 953
    }
  }
}

json + silent options when the package exists removes the JSON 👎

$ npm install --json --silent chalk
# no output

Expected Behavior

npm install --silent --json <existingPackage> should silent the log and leave the json result.

Steps To Reproduce

Default config

Environment

• npm: 8.9.0
• Node.js: v18.1.0
• OS Name: 21.4.0 Darwin Kernel Version 21.4.0 RELEASE_ARM64_T6000 arm64
• System Model Name: MacBook Pro (14-inch, 2021)
• npm config:

; "user" config from /Users/arnauddebec/.npmrc

//registry.npmjs.org/:_authToken = (protected) 

; node bin location = /Users/arnauddebec/.nvm/versions/node/v18.1.0/bin/node
; node version = v18.1.0
; npm local prefix = /Users/arnauddebec/Dev/nacre-test/importhellonacre/node_modules/chalk
; npm version = 8.9.0
; cwd = /Users/arnauddebec/Dev/nacre-test/importhellonacre/node_modules/chalk
; HOME = /Users/arnauddebec
; Run `npm config ls -l` to show all defaults.

[lukekarrys]

--silent only really work to silence log messages. But some commands in npm also check npm.silent in order to hide ouput.

npm should imo (in a future breaking change):

• make --silent always hide all output and logging in display.js so it is applied consistently to all commands
• go through commands and remove checks for npm.silent for output
• maybe add a new --loglevel=silent that is NOT an alias for --silent for only hiding all logs

[lukekarrys]

I'm going to close this and track in our v11 roadmap issue: npm/statusboard#488 Semver major changes in the issue tracker tend to get lost.