"Failed to parse json" error while doing "yo angular" - angularjs

Question

I am learning Angular from this tutorial and here is what I have done so far:
I installed Node v0.10.29 successfully on my 64bit Windows 7 machine. After that, while installing yeoman, I got this issue: https://github.com/yeoman/yeoman.io/issues/283
I ignored that issue assuming that its minor and installed generator-angular which was successful. I used cmd as an administrator for all this.
After that, did yo angular and here is what I got:
c:\x-news>yo angular
_-----_
| | .--------------------------.
|--(o)--| | Welcome to Yeoman, |
`---------' | ladies and gentlemen! |
( _'U`_ ) '--------------------------'
/___A___\
| ~ |
__'.___.'__
' ` |° ' Y `
Out of the box I include Bootstrap and some AngularJS recommended modules.
[?] Would you like to use Sass (with Compass)? No
[?] Would you like to include Bootstrap? Yes
[?] Which modules would you like to include?
create app\styles\main.css
create app\index.html
create bower.json
create .bowerrc
create package.json
create Gruntfile.js
invoke angular:common:C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\gener
ator-angular\app\index.js
create .editorconfig
create .gitattributes
create .jshintrc
create .gitignore
create test\.jshintrc
create app\.buildignore
create app\.htaccess
create app\404.html
create app\favicon.ico
create app\robots.txt
create app\views\main.html
create app\images\yeoman.png
invoke angular:main:C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\generat
or-angular\app\index.js
create app\scripts\app.js
invoke angular:controller:C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\g
enerator-angular\app\index.js
create app\scripts\controllers\main.js
create test\spec\controllers\main.js
invoke karma:app
I'm all done. Running bower install & npm install for you to install the require
d dependencies. If this fails, try running the command yourself.
create test\karma.conf.js
create .travis.yml
npm WARN package.json xnews#0.0.0 No description
npm WARN package.json xnews#0.0.0 No repository field.
npm WARN package.json xnews#0.0.0 No README data
npm WARN package.json xnews#0.0.0 No description
npm WARN package.json xnews#0.0.0 No repository field.
npm WARN package.json xnews#0.0.0 No README data
npm WARN deprecated grunt-ngmin#0.0.3: use grunt-ng-annotate instead
npm WARN deprecated ngmin#0.4.1: use ng-annotate instead
bower cached git://github.com/angular/bower-angular-scenario.git#1.2.16
bower validate 1.2.16 against git://github.com/angular/bower-angular-scenar
io.git#1.2.16
bower cached git://github.com/angular/bower-angular.git#1.2.16
bower validate 1.2.16 against git://github.com/angular/bower-angular.git#1.
2.16
bower cached git://github.com/angular/bower-angular-mocks.git#1.2.16
bower validate 1.2.16 against git://github.com/angular/bower-angular-mocks.
git#1.2.16
bower cached git://github.com/es-shims/es5-shim.git#3.1.1
bower validate 3.1.1 against git://github.com/es-shims/es5-shim.git#~3.1.0
bower cached git://github.com/twbs/bootstrap.git#3.2.0
bower validate 3.2.0 against git://github.com/twbs/bootstrap.git#~3.2.0
bower cached git://github.com/bestiejs/json3.git#3.3.2
bower validate 3.3.2 against git://github.com/bestiejs/json3.git#~3.3.1
npm WARN optional dep failed, continuing fsevents#0.2.0
npm ERR! Failed to parse json
ERR! Unexpected string
npm ERR! File: C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Roaming\npm-cache\send\0.1.4\package\packa
ge.json
npm ERR! Failed to parse package.json data.
npm ERR! package.json must be actual JSON, not just JavaScript.
npm ERR!
npm ERR! This is not a bug in npm.
npm ERR! Tell the package author to fix their package.json file. JSON.parse
npm ERR! System Windows_NT 6.1.7601
npm ERR! command "C:\\Program Files\\nodejs\\\\node.exe" "C:\\Program Files\\nod
ejs\\node_modules\\npm\\bin\\npm-cli.js" "install"
npm ERR! cwd c:\x-news
npm ERR! node -v v0.10.29
npm ERR! npm -v 1.4.14
npm ERR! file C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Roaming\npm-cache\send\0.1.4\package\packag
e.json
npm ERR! code EJSONPARSE
npm ERR! Failed to parse json
npm ERR! Unexpected string
npm ERR! File: C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Roaming\npm-cache\send\0.1.4\package\packa
ge.json
npm ERR! Failed to parse package.json data.
npm ERR! package.json must be actual JSON, not just JavaScript.
npm ERR!
npm ERR! This is not a bug in npm.
npm ERR! Tell the package author to fix their package.json file. JSON.parse
npm ERR! System Windows_NT 6.1.7601
npm ERR! command "C:\\Program Files\\nodejs\\\\node.exe" "C:\\Program Files\\nod
ejs\\node_modules\\npm\\bin\\npm-cli.js" "install" "karma-phantomjs-launcher" "k
arma-jasmine" "grunt-karma" "--save-dev"
npm ERR! cwd c:\x-news
npm ERR! node -v v0.10.29
npm ERR! npm -v 1.4.14
npm ERR! file C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Roaming\npm-cache\send\0.1.4\package\packag
e.json
npm ERR! code EJSONPARSE
--
> phantomjs#1.9.7-15 install c:\x-news\node_modules\karma-phantomjs-launcher\nod
e_modules\phantomjs
> node install.js
Download already available at C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Local\Temp\phantomjs\phanto
mjs-1.9.7-windows.zip
Extracting zip contents
Copying extracted folder C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Local\Temp\phantomjs\phantomjs-1
.9.7-windows.zip-extract-1406128242405\phantomjs-1.9.7-windows -> c:\x-news\node
_modules\karma-phantomjs-launcher\node_modules\phantomjs\lib\phantom
Writing location.js file
Done. Phantomjs binary available at c:\x-news\node_modules\karma-phantomjs-launc
her\node_modules\phantomjs\lib\phantom\phantomjs.exe
bower cached git://github.com/jquery/jquery.git#2.1.1
bower validate 2.1.1 against git://github.com/jquery/jquery.git#>= 1.9.0
||
> ws#0.4.31 install c:\x-news\node_modules\karma\node_modules\socket.io\node_mod
ules\socket.io-client\node_modules\ws
> (node-gyp rebuild 2> builderror.log) || (exit 0)
/
c:\x-news\node_modules\karma\node_modules\socket.io\node_modules\socket.io-clien
t\node_modules\ws>node "C:\Program Files\nodejs\node_modules\npm\bin\node-gyp-bi
n\\..\..\node_modules\node-gyp\bin\node-gyp.js" rebuild
npm WARN optional dep failed, continuing fsevents#0.2.0
bower install json3#3.3.2
bower install es5-shim#3.1.1
bower install angular-scenario#1.2.16
bower install angular-mocks#1.2.16
bower install angular#1.2.16
bower install bootstrap#3.2.0
bower install jquery#2.1.1
\-
json3#3.3.2 bower_components\json3
es5-shim#3.1.1 bower_components\es5-shim
angular-scenario#1.2.16 bower_components\angular-scenario
└── angular#1.2.16
angular-mocks#1.2.16 bower_components\angular-mocks
└── angular#1.2.16
angular#1.2.16 bower_components\angular
bootstrap#3.2.0 bower_components\bootstrap
└── jquery#2.1.1
jquery#2.1.1 bower_components\jquery
-\
> jpegtran-bin#0.2.7 postinstall c:\x-news\node_modules\grunt-contrib-imagemin\n
ode_modules\imagemin\node_modules\imagemin-jpegtran\node_modules\jpegtran-bin
> node index.js
√ pre-build test passed successfully-
> gifsicle#0.1.6 postinstall c:\x-news\node_modules\grunt-contrib-imagemin\node_
modules\imagemin\node_modules\imagemin-gifsicle\node_modules\gifsicle
> node index.js
√ pre-build test passed successfully
> optipng-bin#0.3.9 postinstall c:\x-news\node_modules\grunt-contrib-imagemin\no
de_modules\imagemin\node_modules\imagemin-optipng\node_modules\optipng-bin
> node index.js
√ pre-build test passed successfully
> pngquant-bin#0.3.1 postinstall c:\x-news\node_modules\grunt-contrib-imagemin\n
ode_modules\imagemin\node_modules\imagemin-pngquant\node_modules\pngquant-bin
> node index.js
√ pre-build test passed successfully
npm ERR!
npm ERR! Additional logging details can be found in:
npm ERR! c:\x-news\npm-debug.log
npm ERR! not ok code 0
npm ERR!
npm ERR! Additional logging details can be found in:
npm ERR! c:\x-news\npm-debug.log
npm ERR! not ok code 0
app/index.html modified.
c:\x-news>
As you can notice, the first error here is Failed to parse json. Not sure why it is failing.
As per this answer, I did bower install. Nothing was displayed. I assumed it went successful (I checked the version later).
Versions:
c:\x-news>node --version
v0.10.29
c:\x-news>bower --version
1.3.8
c:\x-news>grunt --version
grunt-cli v0.1.13
grunt v0.4.5
c:\x-news>yo --version
1.2.0
c:\x-news>npm --version
1.4.14
I tried this multiple times, starting over, still failed. What am I doing wrong here? Can anyone please point me into the right direction?

Answer 1

Just a tip for anyone running into this issue, the error can be the result of incorrect formatting in your package.json. The terminal error in the question says:
npm ERR! Unexpected string
npm ERR! File: C:\Users\Rahul\AppData\Roaming\npm-cache\send\0.1.4\package\packa
ge.json
So look for something similar in your terminal. It might even point to a specific line number(Note: if it does and you see nothing wrong check a line or two up because the error is often on a line before the one logged in the console error). In my case it pointed to a trailing ',' that caused the JSON parse error.
Carefully go through the package.json line by line. If you don't find anything that could be causing the problem then run npm cache clean and npm install again as suggested above. Hope that helps someone!