Configuring the proxy in vue.config.js for NodeJS and VueJS build

In this tutorial, we will explore how to configure the proxy settings in a VueJS project using the vue.config.js file. This allows us to set up a proxy server that can forward requests to a different server during development and build processes. This is particularly useful when working with NodeJS APIs that are hosted on a different domain.

Step 1: Create a VueJS project

First, make sure you have NodeJS installed on your machine. You can check if NodeJS is installed by running the following command:

node -v

If you don’t have NodeJS installed, you can download it from the official NodeJS website.

To create a new VueJS project, run the following command in your terminal:

vue create my-vue-project

This will create a new VueJS project in a directory called my-vue-project. Navigate into the project directory by running:

cd my-vue-project

Step 2: Configure the proxy settings

To configure the proxy settings for your VueJS project, you need to create a vue.config.js file in the root of your project. This file allows you to customize the webpack configuration used by Vue CLI.

Here is an example of how you can configure the proxy settings to forward requests to a NodeJS API:

module.exports = {
  devServer: {
    proxy: {
      '/api': {
        target: 'http://localhost:3000', // Replace this with the URL of your NodeJS API
        changeOrigin: true,
        pathRewrite: {
          '^/api': ''
        }
      }
    }
  }
};

In this configuration, we are telling Vue to proxy all requests that start with /api to http://localhost:3000, which is the URL of our NodeJS API. The changeOrigin option is set to true to ensure that the request’s host header is also modified.

Step 3: Test the proxy configuration

To test the proxy configuration, start your VueJS project by running the following command:

npm run serve

This will start the development server for your VueJS project. Now, when you make a request to /api in your VueJS code, the request will be forwarded to http://localhost:3000.

Step 4: Build your VueJS project

When you are ready to build your VueJS project for production, run the following command:

npm run build

This will generate a production-ready build of your VueJS project in the dist directory. The proxy settings in vue.config.js will not be used in the production build, as they are only meant for the development server.

In this tutorial, we have learned how to configure the proxy settings in a VueJS project using the vue.config.js file. This allows us to set up a proxy server that can forward requests to a different server during development and build processes. This is particularly useful when working with NodeJS APIs that are hosted on a different domain.