Using Node.js as a simple web server

Asked 2011-05-21T20:44:56.630

1316

I want to run a very simple HTTP server. Every GET request to example.com should get index.html served to it but as a regular HTML page (i.e., same experience as when you read normal web pages).

Using the code below, I can read the content of index.html. How do I serve index.html as a regular web page?

var http = require('http');
var fs = require('fs');
var index = fs.readFileSync('index.html');

http.createServer(function (req, res) {
  res.writeHead(200, {'Content-Type': 'text/plain'});
  res.end(index);
}).listen(9615);

One suggestion below is complicated and requires me to write a get line for each resource (CSS, JavaScript, images) file I want to use.

How can I serve a single HTML page with some images, CSS and JavaScript?

node.js server webserver

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2 Answers

Step1 (inside command prompt [I hope you cd TO YOUR FOLDER]) : npm install express

Step 2: Create a file server.js

var fs = require("fs");
var host = "127.0.0.1";
var port = 1337;
var express = require("express");

var app = express();
app.use(express.static(__dirname + "/public")); //use static files in ROOT/public folder

app.get("/", function(request, response){ //root dir
    response.send("Hello!!");
});

app.listen(port, host);

Please note, you should add WATCHFILE (or use nodemon) too. Above code is only for a simple connection server.

STEP 3: node server.js or nodemon server.js

There is now more easy method if you just want host simple HTTP server. npm install -g http-server

and open our directory and type http-server

https://www.npmjs.org/package/http-server

answered 2013-02-24T14:44:32.250

Edit:

Node.js sample app Node Chat has the functionality you want.
In it's README.textfile
3. Step is what you are looking for.

step1

create a server that responds with hello world on port 8002

step2

create an index.html and serve it

step3

introduce util.js

change the logic so that any static file is served

show 404 in case no file is found

step4

add jquery-1.4.2.js

add client.js

change index.html to prompt user for nickname

Here is the server.js

Here is the util.js

answered 2011-05-21T20:57:32.877

Using Node.js as a simple web server

2 Answers

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