Express Example

Example of using Express to create a RESTful API with Node.js

How to understand this example

This example is based on the Jersey API example from TD#5. You are required to implement a service that exposes a RESTful API to list, add, update and delete user records from a database using Express and Node.js. You are provided with a reference implementation for a similar service that manages Todo lists. The reference code provided is under services/todo.js.

Instead of using Google App Engine for storage, this example uses mock storage services that export an API similar to TD#5's Store interface: getAll, get and save.

One way that this API differs, however, from TD#5's Store is that its functions are non-blocking: (i.e.) they return immediately without waiting for any underlying I/O ops to complete. Instead, these functions follow the JavaScirpt asynchronous tradition: they are all passed a callback function which will be called upon completion of the requested operation and passed any return values, including error flags/messages. Like in the assignment from TD#5, we provided you with the mock storage service for users, it is the node.js module found under stores/user.js.

Pre-requisites

Install Node.js and npm on your system.

To install on Ubuntu:

sudo apt-get install nodejs npm

To install on Windows or Mac OS X: Refer to https://nodejs.org/en/ for packaged installers.

Use npm to install dependencies (include Express)

cd path/to/clonned/git/repo
npm install

How to run:

node app.js

On Ubuntu:

nodejs app.js