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JavaScript

Posted by Ikuyasu Usui
Ikuyasu Usui
36 Points

So, express is a server program? Node is not a server?

I thought Node.js is a sever program and express helps us operate it with ease.

1 Answer

Alexander La Bianca
Alexander La Bianca
15,959 Points

Node.js is a javascript run-time environment for executing javascript on the server side. The code runs on the server. Express on the other hand is a very popular web framework for node applications. It let's you easily set up a node server and creating routing for your website and or API. Node can do that without Express, however it involves more code. Node can also be used for other things though like creating command line applications that you can simply execute on your command line. For example: I had the need to create a program to convert a given xml file into a json file with a particular json structure. I wrote the program in javascript (using node). I can then execute the program in my command line whenever I want.

Ikuyasu Usui
Ikuyasu Usui
36 Points

Thank you. I thought it would be something like that. I had just hard time convincing myself to describe the particular essentialness of Express.js. Because you never learn how to do routings only using Node.js (I believe), it is hard to know the usefulness of Express. So, you are saying that Node.js only can handle various routings?

Alexander La Bianca
Alexander La Bianca
15,959 Points

Node.js can handle all routings. Under the hood Express.js uses Node.js. So in reality Node.js is doing all the routing and setting up the server. Express is just the framework. The Express framework provides us with methods and classes to make the process of setting up a webserver much easier. In Express:

app.get('/home', (req,res)=>{
        res.end('Hello World');
});

That is super simple in express right? This is a get request to our /home route and we respond with "Hello World". Yet when pure Node.js is used, you at first needs to find out what type of request is coming in and do other stuff.

I believe the Node.js basics course takes you through setting up a small app by using pure Node.js. You will see that it is quite repetetive and more convoluted.