Source code is source code, it’s the input into a build process, it doesn’t determine the output: the build process itself must be designed for reproducible builds. Committing all of your dependencies doesn’t give you reproducible builds.

I don’t think committing ‘node_modules’ is egregious, and it has benefits as the post describes, but unfortunately it’s far from _the_ solution to the problems described. Something like Google’s own Bazel is a better option.