We Keep Coding

How to add SSR to existing React.js application in Express.js

I have simple React application and I want to add SSR in Express.js.
I made a bit of a gaff in the beginning and in my repository I just have a frontend folder and in it the whole React app with typescript, babel and webpack configured.
I haven't played with SSR yet, so I'm curious, if I want to make such a server and have its file in the folder next to the frontend folder, would I have to install and set all the dependencies I made inside the`frontend folder, and only then create the server.js file ?
Then in the middle of "frontend/src" I would have 2 files - index.tsx (with React.render() method), because I would like to be able to run the application also without the server. And 2nd file would be indexServer.tsx with React.hydrate() method, which would go to server.js file (i.e. would be for generating application by server). Is this concept right ?
Link to my github repo with this react app: https://github.com/poldeeek/spider-game

If I want to make such a server and have its file in the folder next to the frontend folder, would I have to install and set all the dependencies I made inside the`frontend folder, and only then create the server.js file ?
You'll probably need to re-install all the dependencies if you choose to setup two separate folders like that. I would recommend putting server.js in frontend/server, which can then use the same node_modules as your frontend/src/index.js is using.
Then in the middle of "frontend/src" I would have 2 files - index.tsx (with React.render() method), because I would like to be able to run the application also without the server. And 2nd file would be indexServer.tsx with React.hydrate() method, which would go to server.js file (i.e. would be for generating application by server). Is this concept right ?
There is no right or wrong answer here. If this setup suits your needs, then go with it. The only challenge with this setup is that you have to configure babel and webpack to point to two different files: index.tsx (in case you don't want the server) and indexServer.tsx (in case you want to include the server).

Node.js & Webpack, full restart when a new file is created

I'm currently using webpack-dev-server to automatically reload my Webpack application when a file is changed. This is working great.
On startup, my app checks the files in the project's folders, that data is then used within the webpack.config.js to make the app work properly.
I do this by using fs.readdirSync:
fs.readdirSync('pages', { withFileTypes: true }).forEach(entry => {
// Do something with the files here
}
When I just need to reload a file everything works fine as the files within the app are the same. However when I add a new file that wasn't considered by my startup script, the only way I can make Webpack aware of it is by manually restarting (CTRL+C + npm start) Webpack.
I've looked at the Webpack documentation and I can't find any mention of automating a full restart. Just reloads.
Is there a Webpack setting or an external package that would allow me fully restart Webpack when a file is added within a folder?

Look for nodemon or similar package and integrate it into your workflow.

Angular2: How to go from an "ng serve" hosting to a Node.Js hosting

I've made my first Angular2 application, while using ng servefor hosting. Now I've to add some backend(because I need some small server logic).
I've found this who basically explain me how to host an angular 2 app on nodeJs. But ng serve was doing a lot of things, checking the changes, bundling the differents JS/CSS files, injecting angular into my template, getting my dependencies.
I cannot just "generate" angular web site and then, since I've to update the angular part to get the data from the web api and work with it.
So what should I do to switch from ng serve to an nodeJS?
EDIT:
Viewing the answer, I must not have been clear enough.
My angular JS is not an application that will on client ONLY, I've done some part of it(navigation, some form, ...) but now I need to host a server with web service and websocket to continue the work. It's not about deploying this to a productive server. It's about to moving to an environnement that allow me to work on the server and the client side.

I think I finally understood your question:
Instead of using the devserver bundled with angular-cli (ng serve), you want to use your own Node.js-powered server.
Also, you DON'T WANT TO STATICALLY BUILD your app (ng build). You want to serve the live build (which has to be generated automatically by the server).
Here's how you can do it:
1) Watch, transpile, bundle...
Webpack is perfect for that.
Create a webpack config file with the right settings for an Angular app. Here's an example from angular2-webpack-starter: webpack.dev.js.
The example is bit verbose. Just keep in mind the config file is where you tell webpack how to handle .ts files, what bundle(s) it should generate, etc.
2) Serve the bundle(s) generated by webpack with a Node.js server
I see two options, depending on how much control you want:
2a. Use webpack-dev-server (not a lot of control)
webpack-dev-server --config config/webpack.dev.js --watch src/
You can see that the webpack-dev-server uses the config file previously mentioned.
Again, you can see an example of the full command to run in angular2-webpack-starter's package.json file.
2b. Create your own server (a lot of control)
You could create a Node.js/Express server using the webpack-dev-middleware, to which you would feed the config file created in step #1.
The middleware is the magic link that will let you serve the files emitted from webpack over the Express server.
Example of a Node.js/Express server which uses the webpack-dev-middleware: srcServer.js.
Does that answer your question?

I know this is an old question but I am just having this same concern and I found ngserve proxy option useful. In development you can run node on another port then calls to /api get redirected through to node.js.
https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/blob/master/docs/documentation/stories/proxy.md
package.json gets:
"start": "ng serve --proxy-config proxy.conf.json",
then make a proxy.conf.json file like this
{
"/api": {
"target": "http://localhost:3000",
"secure": false,
"pathRewrite": {
"^/api": ""
}
}
}

run ng build --prod to build your application.
After building the application, you will find your final dist code in dist directory.
Now, use this code in your server.js file in Node.js.
(function() {
const express = require("express");
const app = express();
app.use(express.static(__dirname + "/dist"));
app.listen(80);
console.log("port" + 80);
})();

I'm not sure if this is still relevant, but this might help others get a quick start:
Run your NodeJS server part e.g. like this
nodemon server.js
Open 2nd terminal (in VSCode Ctrl+Shift`) and start client part build & watch
ng build --watch
They will continue to work in parallel, each doing it's own job. This is not exactly the same as ng serve, e.g. this will not reflect your changes immediately inside the page, you still have to hit F5 (which you most probably did anyway before Angular). But this is fast, free and much easier than becoming web-pack guru. And you are still able to switch between terminals to check for any output / errors.

Angular app is a HTML 5 app. So you just need to serve it as a static file in NoeJs.
How
Build your app
ng build --prod
This command will create a folder named dist. The folder content is your HTML app.
Serving your app
Just serve it with your NodeJs app pointing to the index.html file.

ng serve is only for development. It is not intended as a production web server.
ng build --prod --aot --no-sourcemap will bundle your application ready for production and place it in your dist/ directory.
If you want to use Node.js you can use Express with the static file middleware. You will probably also want a RewriteRule middleware to support serverside HTML5 Pushstate.
In reality you don't need NodeJS to serve your built site as it will just be flat files. Nginx, Apache or IIS with rewrite rules to support HTML5 Pushstate will be enough.

How do I obtain the path of a file in a Meteor package?

I know how to get the current directory from a Meteor package, but how do I get the path of a specific file in the project?
node's __dirname and __filename don't work in Meteor.

It is complicated.
meteor run copies your project files to a tree of directories inside <project-dir>/.meteor/local/build, reorganizes them in non-obvious ways (e.g.. the private subdirectory in the original tree becomes the assets subdirectory) and mixes it in with various npm modules to create a bundle that can be executed as a nodejs project. Indeed, to avoid duplications, there is a .gitignore file automatically set up in the .meteor directory that tells git, if you use it for version control, not to copy the .meteor/local directory.
The original project directory gets watched in case you change a file. The change then gets copied into the current project build directory and the project rebuilt.
If you deploy to a remote system, the build gets copied to a server and then run.
process is usually a defined global server-side object, and works according to the node.js API, because the meteor server code is ultimately running in node.js.
So you can run console.log(process.cwd()); in your server-side to obtain the current working directory for the server process, usually something like:
~/<meteor project directory>/.meteor/local/build/programs/server
This suggests that when meteor run is done locally, original project files are in ../../../../../, but don't use that as it may change in the future.
Instead, for the directory containing the original project files, you could use:
baseDir = process.cwd().replace(/\/\.meteor.*$/, '');
This will get the working directory, and truncate everything beginning with /.meteor
This won't work for a server deploy, though, because the original project tree is not needed on the server, only the build. Files that aren't intended to be client or server code could possibly be stuck in the private subdir, which as I mentioned becomes the assets subdir in the build. Ways to currently find files in the build is either manual inspection .meteor/local in a local run, or use of a JS library that calls or imitates gnu find.
Since you mentioned packages, I note that in the build, server-side package code finally ends up in:
~/<project-dir>/.meteor/local/build/programs/server/packages
and client side in:
~/<project-dir>/.meteor/local/build/programs/web.browser/packages

Deploy node.js with zero downtime using naught

I started using naught for node.js deployment (https://github.com/andrewrk/naught).
I have a folder in Ubuntu Server containing my node.js(express) app.
I deployed it using "naught start app.js" from this folder.
Now I would like to redeploy/update my code with zero downtime.
What should I do?
Suppose I have my code on a git server, do I "git pull origin master" in the same folder and then "naught deploy" to deploy the new code? Or maybe I need to pull the new code to a new folder and deploy the new code in another way?

Pulling the latest changed from Git and calling 'naught deploy' should do the trick. You don't need to clone your code a different directory.
Notice that the 'deploy' command expects an .ipc file, and by default looks for it in the same directory from which you called deploy. If, when starting naught you specified a different location for the .ipc file, then you should call deploy with that location.
So for example, if you did:
naught start app.js --ipc-file /var/run/naught.ipc
Then when deploying use:
naught deploy /var/run/naught.ipc
At BigPanda we use naught in production this way, and it works perfectly.