Node or node.js or nodejs is a general purpose programming platform for JavaScript, often used for server-side web development. Node used Google’s V8 JavaScript engine and some components written in C; its performance is good.
On Debian:
# apt-get install nodejs npm
npm is the node package manager.
Node has a REPL, invoked with:
$ nodejs
> .help
.break Sometimes you get stuck, this gets you out
.clear Alias for .break
.exit Exit the repl
.help Show repl options
.load Load JS from a file into the REPL session
.save Save all evaluated commands in this REPL session to a file
>
A simple nodejs server:
var http = require('http');
http.createServer(function (req, res) {
res.writeHead(200, {'Content-Type': 'text/plain'});
res.end('Hello, World!\n');
}).listen(9090, "127.0.0.1");
console.log('Server running at http://127.0.0.1:9090/');
Run it like:
$ nodejs hello.js
For web apps, many sources recommend using the “express” module to provide basic MVC glue.
$ npm install express
By default, npm install modules to $PWD/node_modules
.
Express does not include a template engine. Try Jade. http://jade-lang.com/
npm installs node modules at $NODE_PATH or ~/node_modules/ by default.
var express = require('express');
var app = express.createServer();
app.get('/', function(req, res) {
res.send('Welcome to node express.');
});
app.listen(9090);