Supported tags and respective Dockerfile links

• 7 7.5.0-r1 latest
• 6 6.9.5-r0
• 4 4.7.3-r0

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What is Node.js?

Node.js is a platform built on Chrome's JavaScript runtime for easily building fast, scalable network applications. Node.js uses an event-driven, non-blocking I/O model that makes it lightweight and efficient, perfect for data-intensive real-time applications that run across distributed devices.

nodejs.org

TLDR

docker run -it --name node bitnami/node

Docker Compose

node:
  image: bitnami/node
  command: npm start
  volumes:
    - .:/app

Get this image

The recommended way to get the Bitnami Node.js Docker Image is to pull the prebuilt image from the Docker Hub Registry.

docker pull bitnami/node:latest

To use a specific version, you can pull a versioned tag. You can view the list of available versions in the Docker Hub Registry.

docker pull bitnami/node:[TAG]

If you wish, you can also build the image yourself.

docker build -t bitnami/node https://github.com/bitnami/bitnami-docker-node.git

Entering the REPL

By default, running this image will drop you into the Node.js REPL, where you can interactively test and try things out in Node.js.

docker run -it --name node bitnami/node

Further Reading:

• nodejs.org/api/repl.html

Running your Node.js script

The default work directory for the Node.js image is /app. You can mount a folder from your host here that includes your Node.js script, and run it normally using the node command.

docker run -it --name node -v /path/to/app:/app bitnami/node \
  node script.js

Running a Node.js app with npm dependencies

If your Node.js app has a package.json defining your app's dependencies and start script, you can install the dependencies before running your app.

docker run --rm -v /path/to/app:/app bitnami/node npm install
docker run -it --name node  -v /path/to/app:/app bitnami/node npm start

or using Docker Compose:

node:
  image: bitnami/node
  command: "sh -c 'npm install && npm start'"
  volumes:
    - .:/app

Further Reading:

• package.json documentation
• npm start script

Accessing a Node.js app running a web server

By default the image exposes the port 3000 of the container. You can use this port for your Node.js application server.

Below is an example of an express.js app listening to remote connections on port 3000:

var express = require('express');
var app = express();

app.get('/', function (req, res) {
  res.send('Hello World!');
});

var server = app.listen(3000, '0.0.0.0', function () {

  var host = server.address().address;
  var port = server.address().port;

  console.log('Example app listening at http://%s:%s', host, port);
});

To access your web server from your host machine you can ask Docker to map a random port on your host to port 3000 inside the container.

docker run -it --name node -v /path/to/app:/app -P bitnami/node node index.js

Run docker port to determine the random port Docker assigned.

$ docker port node
3000/tcp -> 0.0.0.0:32769

You can also specify the port you want forwarded from your host to the container.

docker run -it --name node -p 8080:3000 -v /path/to/app:/app bitnami/node node index.js

Access your web server in the browser by navigating to http://localhost:8080.

Connecting to other containers

If you want to connect to your Node.js web server inside another container, you can use docker networking to create a network and attach all the containers to that network.

Serving your Node.js app through an nginx frontend

We may want to make our Node.js web server only accessible via an nginx web server. Doing so will allow us to setup more complex configuration, serve static assets using nginx, load balance to different Node.js instances, etc.

Step 1: Create a network

docker network create app-tier --driver bridge

or using Docker Compose:

version: '2'

networks:
  app-tier:
    driver: bridge

Step 2: Create a virtual host

Let's create an nginx virtual host to reverse proxy to our Node.js container.

server {
    listen 0.0.0.0:80;
    server_name yourapp.com;

    location / {
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header HOST $http_host;
        proxy_set_header X-NginX-Proxy true;

        # proxy_pass http://[your_node_container_link_alias]:3000;
        proxy_pass http://myapp:3000;
        proxy_redirect off;
    }
}

Notice we've substituted the link alias name myapp, we will use the same name when creating the container.

Copy the virtual host above, saving the file somewhere on your host. We will mount it as a volume in our nginx container.

Step 3: Run the Node.js image with a specific name

docker run -it --name myapp --network app-tier \
  -v /path/to/app:/app \
  bitnami/node node index.js

or using Docker Compose:

version: '2'
myapp:
  image: bitnami/node
  command: node index.js
  networks:
    - app-tier
  volumes:
    - .:/app

Step 4: Run the nginx image

docker run -it \
  -v /path/to/vhost.conf:/bitnami/nginx/conf/vhosts/yourapp.conf:ro \
  --network app-tier \
  bitnami/nginx

or using Docker Compose:

version: '2'
nginx:
  image: bitnami/nginx
  networks:
    - app-tier
  volumes:
    - /path/to/vhost.conf:/bitnami/nginx/conf/vhosts/yourapp.conf:ro

Maintenance

Upgrade this image

Bitnami provides up-to-date versions of Node.js, including security patches, soon after they are made upstream. We recommend that you follow these steps to upgrade your container.

Step 1: Get the updated image

docker pull bitnami/node:latest

or if you're using Docker Compose, update the value of the image property to bitnami/node:latest.

Step 2: Remove the currently running container

docker rm -v node

or using Docker Compose:

docker-compose rm -v node

Step 3: Run the new image

Re-create your container from the new image.

docker run --name node bitnami/node:latest

or using Docker Compose:

docker-compose start node

Notable Changes

6.2.0-r0 (2016-05-11)

• Commands are now executed as the root user. Use the --user argument to switch to another user or change to the required user using sudo to launch applications. Alternatively, as of Docker 1.10 User Namespaces are supported by the docker daemon. Refer to the daemon user namespace options for more details.

4.1.2-0 (2015-10-12)

• Permissions fixed so bitnami user can install global npm modules without needing sudo.

4.1.1-0-r01 (2015-10-07)

• /app directory is no longer exported as a volume. This caused problems when building on top of the image, since changes in the volume are not persisted between Dockerfile RUN instructions. To keep the previous behavior (so that you can mount the volume in another container), create the container with the -v /app option.

Contributing

We'd love for you to contribute to this Docker image. You can request new features by creating an issue, or submit a pull request with your contribution.

Issues

If you encountered a problem running this container, you can file an issue. For us to provide better support, be sure to include the following information in your issue:

• Host OS and version
• Docker version (docker version)
• Output of docker info
• Version of this container (echo $BITNAMI_IMAGE_VERSION inside the container)
• The command you used to run the container, and any relevant output you saw (masking any sensitive information)

License

Copyright (c) 2015-2016 Bitnami

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.