Scaffold Backend API in Node.js with Express

If you’re looking to build a backend API in Node.js, Express is a popular and versatile choice. Express is a fast, unopinionated, minimalist web framework for Node.js that has a robust set of features for building web and mobile applications.

Setting up the Project

First, make sure you have Node.js and npm installed on your machine. Then, create a new directory for your project and navigate to it in your terminal. Run the following command to generate a new package.json file:

npm init -y

Next, install Express and nodemon as dependencies for your project:

npm install express nodemon

Creating the Server

Create a new file called server.js in your project directory. In this file, import Express and create a new instance of the app:

    
const express = require('express');
const app = express();

app.use(express.json());
    
  

Now you can start defining your API routes and handling requests. Here’s an example of a basic GET route:

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

Running the Server

You can now start the server by adding the following code at the bottom of your server.js file:

    
const PORT = process.env.PORT || 3000;

app.listen(PORT, () => {
  console.log(`Server is running on port ${PORT}`);
});
    
  

Run the server with nodemon to automatically restart the server whenever you make changes to your code:

nodemon server.js

Conclusion

With the above steps, you now have a basic scaffold for building a backend API in Node.js with Express. You can continue to add more routes, middleware, and other functionalities to suit your specific project requirements.