'Uncaught SyntaxError: Unexpected token <' in Node.js

Question

I am getting the below screen-shot error when I try to serve my client-side code. When I am trying to run node server/server.js:

The below is my server.js code...

app.use(express.static(path.join(__dirname, "public")));
app.use(logger('dev'));
app.use(bodyParser.json({limit: '50mb'}));

app.all('/*', function(req, res, next){
    res.header("Access-Control-Allow-Origin", "*");
    res.header("Access-Control-Allow-Methods", "GET, PUT, POST, DELETE, OPTIONS");
    res.header("Access-Control-Allow-Headers", "Content-type,Accept,X-Access-Token,X-Key");

    if(req.method === 'OPTIONS'){
        res.status(200).end();
    } else {
        next();
    }

});

app.all("/api/v1/*", [require('./middlewares/validateRequest')]);
app.use("/", require("./routes"));

app.use(function(req, res, next){
    var err = new Error("Not found");
    err.status = 404;
    next(err);
});

Inside my routes/index.js, I have the following for get request.

router.get('*', function(req, res) {
    res.sendfile('./public/index.html');
});

Answer 1

Usually when the browser requests a JavaScript file, the server sends an HTML file. This is due to rules like app.get('*'.... So we need to tell the server to send the static files first and then declare the rules, like shown below:

// Declare static folder to be served. It contains the JavaScript code, images, CSS, etc.
app.use(express.static('build'));

// Serve the index.html for all the other requests so that the
// router in the JavaScript application can render the necessary components
app.get('*', function(req, res){
  res.sendFile(path.join(__dirname + '/build/index.html'));
  //__dirname : It will resolve to your project folder.
});

Answer 2

I found the solution. The Node.js application tries to compile the JavaScript files inside the public folder, that makes a mistake; you defined the public folder like this:

app.use(express.static(path.join(__dirname, 'public')));

Try to define it using a virtual directory by adding a specific virtual folder name like this:

app.use('/static', express.static(path.join(__dirname, 'public')));

This should be work;