How to restart Node on a docker container without restarting the whole container?

Question

I have a container ==> FROM node:5 Node should restart after each change in the code.

But there is no way for me restart the Node server without restarting the whole docker container.

I have many npm install on dockerfile that runs each time I restart the container, and it's annoying to wait for all of them after each change in the code.

I'm already using shared folder to have the latest code in my container.

Answer 1

If you just need the Node.js server to restart after changes, instead of starting the server with the node command you can use a tool like node-dev or nodemon. To leverage these, you'd need to update the command in your Dockerfile, e.g. CMD [ "node-dev", "server.js" ].

Since you already have your local files as a volume in the Docker container, any change to those files will restart the server.