Npm audit fails for offline repository

Problem description: When the npm client is configured with a virtual and the remote repository inside is offline, the npm audit command fails. This audit command should return results as Artifactory is connected to Xray and therefore should return the results from Xray. 

Environment details: Art:  7.27.10, Xray:  3.38.2.

What is the impact to the customer - What are they trying to achieve? They’re trying to run the npm audit command while having the remote repository offline

Steps to reproduce:

1. Set up Artifactory and Xray 
2. Create a virtual npm repo with a local and remote (npmjs) that’s indexed in Xray
3. Install an npm package from the virtual repository
4. Turn the remote npm repo offline
5. Execute the $ npm audit command

Expected: npm audit returns results from Xray

Actual: the npm client fails with the following error:

> npm audit
npm ERR! code ENOAUDIT
npm ERR! audit Your configured registry (http://ART_URL/artifactory/api/npm/npm/) may not support audit requests, or the audit endpoint may be temporarily unavailable.

Here are the relevent request/service logs (see below for full stacktrace):

artifactory-request:

2022-01-02T06:53:13.207Z|69b254659dc06af2|<IP>|anonymous|POST|/api/npm/Maya-Virtual-Npm/-/npm/v1/security/audits/quick|500|1915|0|7|npm/6.13.4 node/v12.16.1 win32 x64

artifactory-service:

2022-01-02T06:53:13.206Z [jfrt ] [ERROR] [69b254659dc06af2] [c.e.m.GlobalExceptionMapper:48] [p-nio-8081-exec-5085] - Repo is offline. Cannot use the HTTP client.
java.lang.IllegalStateException: Repo is offline. Cannot use the HTTP client.
at org.artifactory.repo.HttpRepo.getHttpClient(HttpRepo.java:1100)

It’s worth noting that after removing the remote repo from the virtual, the npm audit succeeds, pulling the report from Xray:

artifactory-request.log:

2022-02-08T11:25:35.969Z|79a97d3038b3c360|<IP>|admin|POST|/api/npm/npm/-/npm/v1/security/audits|200|889|0|92|npm/6.14.4 node/v12.16.2 darwin x64

searching for the trace id in xray-request:

xray-request.log:2022-02-08T11:25:35.949Z|79a97d3038b3c360|<IP>|jfrt@01fnb3kt87gmn81tj682980dey|POST|/api/v1/audit/npm|200|-1|2973|62.504000|XrayJavaClient/1.0.8

Onprem

Workaround: Turn the repository back online but this defeats the purpose of having the offline option