express-building-blocks

This project aims to provide reusable components for your actual and future express.js project(s).

The building blocks of this project (and I hope your projects as well) are:

• node.js 4.x the, new LTS of Node Foundation, and it has brought more fresh air than we seen in years.
• Bluebird - if you don't know Petka Antonov jewel, you have some reading to do
• XError - Javascript errors for web services
• Electrolyte - Inversion of Control for node.js, provides a Dependency Injection mechanism similar to what you've seen on Angular.js or more advanced frameworks

Special Thanks to:

• Yuri Zarubin - most of this work was inspired by his ideas

Ground-up Idea:

Any controller in this project returns a Bluebird Promise, when it's resolved it's usually a payload to send to the user, or a context to be compiled in a page template.
When the Promise gets rejected, it is usually an XError that describes which error code, HTTP response and HTTP code use to reply the user.

Tests are not on endpoints, no supertest here, tests are on controllers, and are Promise-Based.

Generic components and specific components for your Application

In web services specific solutions are sometimes required, while you don't want to publish those, as they might reflect business logic, happens usually to not publish anything at all, keeping the entire project closed source.

This repository shows how a middle-ground is achievable through using DI, and specifically electrolyte.

Directory structure

<YOURPROJECT>
 | - package.json
 | - app.js # your express application
 | - components/ # directory containing app-specific components
 | - components/logic.js # specific business logic for your application
 | - node_modules # dependencies of your project, togheter with ebb
 | - node_modules/express-building-blocks # this component library
 | - node_modules/express-building-blocks/components/test.js
 | - ioc.js # Inversion of Control loader

a sample ioc.js can be like:

var path = require('path');
var components = path.join(path.dirname(require.resolve('express-building-blocks')), 'components');

var ioc = require('electrolyte');
ioc.use(ioc.node(__dirname));
ioc.use('components', ioc.node(components));
module.exports = ioc;

With such ioc.js structure, you can mix and match local component(s) with express-building-blocks component(s).

sample components/logic.js:

exports = module.exports = function () {
    console.log('This components comprises corporate business logic!');
};

sample node_modules/express-building-blocks/components/test.js:

exports = module.exports = function () {
    console.log('Generic components used for console logging this message');
};

in your app.js:

var ioc = require('./ioc');
ioc.create('components/logic');
ioc.create('components/test');

The result will be:

$ node app.js
This components comprises corporate business logic!
Generic components used for console logging this message
$

A full, working example can be found in example dir.