Preface

This book is about Express, the popular web framework used by thousands of Node.js developers around the world. It specifically covers the third major version of the framework, commonly referred to as Express 3.

Express has matured considerably since it was first released exactly four years ago. Today it is recognized as one of the best web frameworks for Node.js. Every day new developers from varied backgrounds and experience come to Express for developing their web apps. With its ever-growing popularity, it is about time we had a book on Express.

I wrote a tutorial on Express some time ago that became quite popular online, particularly with those new to Node.js and Express. Ever since, I had a dream of writing a book on Express, which would make no assumptions about the reader's prior experience and knowledge, and still be full of technical details wherever required. The book you are holding in your hands is that dream realized—a book on Express that is both beginner-friendly and technically deep at the same time.

This book covers everything a developer requires to get into serious web development using Express.

What this book covers

Chapter 1, What is Express?, is a beginner-friendly but technically solid introduction to Express and relevant topics for a strong base right at the start.

Chapter 2, Your First Express App, is a practical introduction to building an Express app covering the basics that form the basis of every Express app.

Chapter 3, Understanding Express Routes, explains routes in Express in great detail.

Chapter 4, Response From the Server, covers the various ways an Express app can respond to a request.

Chapter 5, The Jade Templating Language, covers the Jade syntax and its programming capabilities.

Chapter 6, The Stylus CSS Preprocessor, covers the Stylus syntax and its programming capabilities.

Chapter 7, Forms, Cookies, and Sessions, covers how to handle forms, and create cookies and sessions.

Chapter 8, Express in Production, covers important areas to make Express apps production-ready.

What you need for this book

Familiarity with JavaScript, the command line, and interest in the subject are all you need to get the most out of the book. Any new and relevant topics are introduced and explained in an easy-to-understand manner.

Who this book is for

This book is for anyone interested in knowing more about Express—either for developing web applications or just for technical knowledge in general. It is friendly enough for beginners to get started with, at the same time detailed enough to make an excellent refresher for those already familiar with Express who want to know more about it.

Conventions

In this book, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles, and an explanation of their meaning.

Code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input, and Twitter handles are shown as follows: "The router middleware is responsible for handling the requests to the app."

A block of code is set as follows:

app.get('/', function(req, res) {
  res.json({message: 'welcome'});
});

When we wish to draw your attention to a particular part of a code block, the relevant lines or items are set in bold:

var not_found = function(req, res) {
  res.status(404);
  res.render('404', {title: 'Not Found'});
};

Any command-line input or output is written as follows:

$ sudo npm install express -g

New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, in menus or dialog boxes for example, appear in the text like this: "The server will respond with the appropriate data type based on the Accept header."

Note

Warnings or important notes appear in a box like this.

Tip

Tips and tricks appear like this.

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