Run a Node.js App

To run a Node.js app on a Space Micro, it is recommended to use Node.js v16 since it works with Space out of the box.

⚠️ Make sure that your Micro is configured to listen on the port number specified in the environment variable PORT.

Here’s the Spacefile needed to get a basic Node.js app running on Space:

v: 0
micros:
  - name: node-micro
    src: src/node
    engine: nodejs16
    dev: nodemon index.js
    run: "node index.js"

index.js

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

const port = process.env.PORT

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

app.listen(port, () => {
  console.log(`Example app listening on port ${port}`)
})

ℹ️ We use nodemon to watch for changes in our code and restart the server automatically. You can use any other tool you like.

If your Node Micro has a build step (e.g. because you are using TypeScript) use a config similar to the following:

v: 0
micros:
  - name: node-micro
    src: src/node
    engine: nodejs16
    dev: "npm run dev"
    commands:
      - npm run build
    include:
      - build
    run: "node build/index.js"

• commands specifies which commands to run during build, in our case our NPM script build
• include specifies which directory to include in the final app package, everything else will be ignored. In our case we set it to the directory of our build output
• dev specifies the command to start your Micro in development mode. In our case running the dev script in our package.json
• run specifies the command to start your Micro. In our case running the index.js file in our build directory using node

ℹ️ Support for Node.js v18 is coming soon.