api

is a module for easily providing several pluggable RESTful APIs and other dynamic content on a single server. It extends http.Server.

Installation

npm install -g api

Usage

api comes with an executable. If you run api from your console, the script walks up the path of your current working directory and looks for a directory named .conf that contains a file named api.json. This file must contain several values. Here's an annotated version of such a file.

{
  "protocol": "http",               // "http" or "https"
  "connection": {                   // host and port of that server
    "hostname": "localhost",
    "port": 1337
  },
  "directories": {
    "modules": ".conf/modules"      // directory that contains submodules
  },
  "modules": [
    "example"                       // modules that are loaded on startup
  ],
  "errorPages": {                   // error pages
    "404": ".conf/error/404.html",
    "500": ".conf/error/500.html"
  },
  "logFile": ".conf/api.log"        // the log file
}

Just copy & paste this file to .conf/api.json, if you want to use it, but don’t forget to remove the comments. JSON files are not allowed to contain comments for some reason.

This example configuration starts a server at http://localhost:1337. It also defines .conf/module as the directory for submodules and registers one module "example". To add code for that module, you have to create the file .conf/modules/example.js. A module must export a single function (function (app, logger, conf, globalConf, started)).

• app is a reference of the Server object.
• logger is a stoopid logger.
• conf is a module specific configuration object.
• globalConf is the global configuration object from .conf/api.json.
• started is a callback (function (err)), that is used to return errors or let api know, that the module has been started.

Each module may have its own configuration JSON files. These go directly into the .conf directory. Just create a JSON file with the name of the module (e.g. .conf/example.json) and it will be exposed to the conf parameter.

Here’s the code of an example module.

.conf/modules/example.js:

module.exports = function example(app, logger, conf, globalConf, started) {
  // register request listeners
  app.get('^/hello-world.html', function helloWorld(req, resp) {
    logger.info('Somebody visited "/hello-world.html".');
    resp.writeHead(200, { 'Content-Type': 'text/html' });
    resp.end('<b>Hello World!</b>');
  });

  started(); // send the callback after everything has been set up.
}

You can try the example by starting api from the console. You should see the following output on stdout:

[process] - Server up and running.
[process] - Starting module "example".
[process] - Module "example" up and running.

Now you can visit http://localhost:1337/hello-world.html and you should see

Hello World!

as well as

[process] - Somebody visited "/hello-world.html"

API

The api Server object has all the methods of http.Server (or https.Server, if you configured it with https). There are also some additional methods, that are more or less shortcuts for common events:

• on(path, callback) handles any requests that match path, no matter which http method is used.
• get(path, callback) handles all GET request that match path.
• post(path, callback) handles all POST requests that match path.
• put(path, callback) handles all PUT requests that match path.
• delete(path, callback) handles all DELETE requests that match path.
• head(path, callback) handles all HEAD requests that match path.

path is a string representation of that RegExp object. Slashes (/) don’t need to be escaped.

callback is a callback function (function (req, resp)) just like in the http 'request' event.

Bugs and Issues

If you encounter any bugs or issues, feel free to open an issue at github or send me an e-mail to paul(at)vorb.de.

License

Copyright © 2011-2012 Paul Vorbach

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the “Software”), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED “AS IS”, WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.