Node + Express with static HTML. How to route all requests to index.html?

Question

I am working on a single page web app using Node + Express and Handlebars for templating. Everything currently works well from index.html, which is served from a pretty standard server.js file:

var express = require('express');  var server = express(); server.use(express.static(__dirname + '/public'));  var port = 10001; server.listen(port, function() {     console.log('server listening on port ' + port); }); 

This works perfectly when loading from http://localhost:10001/. My issue is that I'm using push states in the app, so the browser may show a URL like http://localhost:10001/foo/bar and then if I refresh the page, I get the error Cannot GET /foo/bar since there is no route for this.

So my question, and pardon my incredible noobishness when it comes to Node, can I make it so all requests route to index.html? The JavaScript in my app can handle showing the right content based on URL params on page load. I don't want to define custom routes as the number would be large, and the paths for them can change dynamically.

Answer 1

const express = require('express') const server = express()  /* route requests for static files to appropriate directory */ server.use('/public', express.static(__dirname + '/static-files-dir'))  /* other routes defined before catch-all */ server.get('/some-route', (req, res) => {   res.send('ok') })  /* final catch-all route to index.html defined last */ server.get('/*', (req, res) => {   res.sendFile(__dirname + '/index.html'); })  const port = 8000; server.listen(port, function() {   console.log('server listening on port ' + port) }) 

Answer 2

This pattern will serve static assets before hitting the catch-all route that serves up your front-end application. To register any additional routes, just add them above the catch-all route.

var express = require('express'); var server = express();  // middleware server.use(express.static(__dirname + '/public'));  // routes server.use('*', function (req, res) {   // serve file });  var port = 10001; server.listen(port, function() {   console.log('server listening on port ' + port); });