[mvindahl]

But can yarn fix this?

Say that I use yarn to depend upon some module X, specifying a fixed version number like the good boy scout that I am. Module X resides on npmjs and in turn depends upon the bleeding edge version of module Y. And then one day module Y goes all Galaxy Note and bursts into flames.

Can yarn shield my app from that?

[nilliams]

Yes it claims to provide a lockfile while locks all your deps all the way down the dependency tree.

You can do (and are supposed to do) the same with npm's own shrinkwrap, but people claim that it doesn't work as intended.