boiler-express-node v1.0.0

🚀 boiler-express-node - A Ready-to-Use Boilerplate for Express.js

boiler-express-node is a well-structured boilerplate template designed to streamline the development of MVC-based applications using Express.js. With this template, you can quickly start building APIs and web applications with minimal setup.

⚠️ ATTENTION

• After installing the dependencies with npm install, navigate to the node_modules folder in your project directory.
• Inside node_modules, locate the boiler-express-node folder.
• Copy the boiler-express-node folder to your root project directory to start using the boilerplate structure easily.
• This step ensures that the boilerplate template is accessible and ready for customization in your project.

Follow these steps carefully to set up the boilerplate for your development workflow.

📋 Features:

• 🏗️ Pre-configured MVC structure to easily start building APIs and web applications.
• 📦 Pre-created demoUser API that you can use and run immediately.
• 🔒 Essential development packages for security, validation, authentication, and database management.
• 🗄️ MongoDB support for database interaction.
• 🔑 Environment variable management, CORS, and automatic server restarts during development.

📦 Pre-installed Packages:

1. Nodemon 🔄

• Nodemon monitors file changes and automatically restarts the server during development, saving you from manually restarting after each code change.

2. Express ⚡

• Express is a minimal and flexible web framework for building APIs and web applications. It simplifies routing, middleware handling, and HTTP requests.

3. BcryptJS 🔐

• BcryptJS is used for password hashing and authentication, ensuring that sensitive data is securely stored and verified.

4. CORS 🌐

• CORS (Cross-Origin Resource Sharing) middleware is essential for handling requests from different origins (domains), allowing secure API interactions from various sources.

5. Dotenv 📜

• Dotenv loads environment variables from a .env file into process.env, keeping sensitive information like API keys and database credentials safe and out of your codebase.

6. Joi 📏

• Joi is a powerful schema validation library that helps validate incoming data, ensuring that your application receives data in the correct format.

7. JSON Web Token (JWT) 🛡️

• JWT is used for securely transmitting information between client and server. It's mainly used for user authentication, generating tokens for session management.

8. Mongoose 🐱

• Mongoose is an ODM (Object Data Modeling) library for MongoDB. It simplifies data model definition and interaction with MongoDB collections.

📝 Create a .env file

Note: Ensure you have filled in all the values in the .env file, especially for sensitive data like the MongoDB URI, JWT secret, and mail credentials.

PORT           = YOUR_SERVER_PORT
MONGODB_URI    = YOUR_MONGODB_URI
JWT_SECRET     = YOUR_JWT_SECRET
JWT_EXPIRES_IN = YOUR_JWT_EXPIRES_IN
API_KEY        = YOUR_API_KEY
DB_USER        = YOUR_DB_USER
DB_PASSWORD    = YOUR_DB_PASSWORD
DB_NAME        = YOUR_DB_NAME
DB_HOST        = YOUR_DB_HOST
MAIL_HOST      = YOUR_MAIL_HOST
MAIL_PORT      = YOUR_MAIL_PORT
MAIL_USER      = YOUR_MAIL_USER
MAIL_PASS      = YOUR_MAIL_PASS
SESSION_SECRET = YOUR_SESSION_SECRET
CORS_ORIGIN    = YOUR_CORS_ORIGIN

📄 Environment Variables:

• PORT: Port your server will run on (e.g., 3000).
• MONGODB_URI: MongoDB connection string (e.g., mongodb://localhost:27017/mydatabase).
• JWT_SECRET: A strong, unique secret key used to sign JWT tokens.
• JWT_EXPIRES_IN: Token expiration time, e.g., 1h, 24h.
• API_KEY: Your third-party API key (e.g., for mail services).
• DB_USER, DB_PASSWORD, DB_NAME, DB_HOST: Credentials for connecting to your database.
• MAIL_HOST, MAIL_PORT, MAIL_USER, MAIL_PASS: Mail service configuration for sending emails.
• SESSION_SECRET: Secret key for managing user sessions.
• CORS_ORIGIN: Allowed origins for Cross-Origin Resource Sharing.

📍 Useful Links:

• 📚 Express Documentation
• 📖 MongoDB Documentation
• 🛠️ JWT Documentation
• 📝 Mongoose Documentation
• 🌍 Dotenv Documentation
• 🔄 Nodemon Documentation
• 🔑 BcryptJS Documentation
• ✅ Joi Documentation
• 🌐 CORS Documentation

📝 Additional Notes:

• This boilerplate template is designed to help you get up and running quickly with Express.js. Ensure that you update sensitive values in the .env file before running the app.

• If you're using a production environment, make sure to follow proper security practices for handling API keys, secrets, and other sensitive data.

Getting Started

To get started with this template, follow the steps below:

1. Start the development server:

npm run dev

Explore the project:

• The server will automatically restart when changes are made. Check the demoUser API for example routes.