Node Mocha Skeleton

NMS is a skeleton for building libraries in Node.JS. Clone the repo, and use it as a jumping-off point.

It demonstrates the approach I've gradually developed over the years for structuring my Node.JS libraries:

it provides ready-to-run examples of the mocha testing framework.
it demonstrates the usage of underscore, as a way to prettify array and object manipulation.
it demonstrates the usage of optimist, a great library for simplifying the building of command-line applications.

Directory Structure

lib/ this is where all of your applications code will be stored. I approach my design in an OOP manner; hello.js contains a Hello class, banana.js a Banana class, etc.
test/ mocha will discover any tests that you place in this directory. There is generally a corresponding library file for each test, e.g., hello.js has a corresponding hello-test.js.
bin/ files within this folder expose a command-line-interface to your application. When npm install -g is run, these scripts will be installed globally.
package.json this file serves several purposes: it provides meta-information surrounding your project: author, version, description, etc; it describes the directory structure of your project; it describes your project's dependencies, (running npm install will install the dependencies described in package.json).
Makefile the make file is used to run the Mocha test framework. npm test looks for this Makefile, and uses it to execute Mocha's test suite.
README.md a great README file is an important part of any project, take some time to learn the ins and outs of markdown.

There are a few libraries that I pull into almost every Node.JS project that I begin:

mocha mocha is a light-weight testing framework for JavaScript. It provides both BDD and TDD interfaces, allowing you to choose whichever you feel more comfortable with.
underscore underscore provides functional programming constructs: map, reduce, extend, etc. It really helps to cleanup the logic surrounding array and object manipulation my applications.
optimist optimst is a simple, powerful, command-line-argument parser.
sinon sinon is a stand-alone testing framework. I use it specifically for its stubbing functionality.

Install the current stable version of Node.JS
- NPM is now packaged along with Node.JS, hooray!
Clone this repo git clone git://github.com/bcoe/node-mocha-skeleton.git your-project-name
Run npm install within the project directory.
Run npm test.
all tests should pass, if they don't:
- try to fix any obvious dependency issues, do you have make installed?
- is the problem my fault, create an issue on this project.
Modify the skeleton project to your heart's content:
- remove the .git folder.
- run git init.
- add your new project as the origin, git remote add origin your-project-name.git
- edit the package.json, make it your own.
Once you've built a killer library, make sure to publish it on NPM:
- npm adduser
- npm publish
- npm update when you roll new versions.