Grundkurs i Node.js

Background and Overview

• History
• Ryan Dahl
• Properties
• Architecture
• Wrapping the LINUX system API
• Installation of NodeJS and NPM
• Running the REPL
• Running script files
• NodeJS API documentation

1 - MODULES

Common.js Modules

• Modules in Node.js
• Understanding require()
• Usage of built-in (core) modules
• User-defined file modules
• User-defined folder modules
• Modules folder
• Understanding the module concept
• Scope
• IIFE
• The module design pattern
• How to implement a simple require()
• A glims beind Node's own implementation of require()

ES Modules (ESM)

• ES versions and Node.js
• What is ES modules?
• ESM support in Node and from which version
• How to apply ESM in modern Node
• Export forms
• Import forms
• Path forms
• Importing core API modules

Using TypeScript with Node.js

• Anders Hejlsberg
• Brief about strong typing
• Installation of TS

2 - REMOTE MODULES

Using NPM

• Isaac Z Schluter
• What is NPM?
• Installation of a NPM local package
• Installation of a remote NPM package
• Dependencies, app vs. dev
• Useful commands
• Beware of the node-bloat problem
• Publishing a NPM package
• Using a private NPM registry
• Verdaccio
• Alternatives to NPM, such as PNPM and Yarn

Node Scripts

• Node shell scripts
• Deployment
• Installation

Using NPX

• The problem of globally installed Node scripts
• Install locally and use NPX
• How to install ephemerally and use NPX
• Usage of the package option
• NPX is really NPM exec
• Kick-starting a fresh project
• Script entries in package.json

3 - ASYNCHRONOUS EXECUTION

Call-Backs

• How do JS execute?
• The JS event loop
• The JS call-back queue
• The event loop of Node
• Postponed and periodic computation
• The Node API is a wrapper around the Linux API
• Why you cannot translate a C program straight into Node
• Understanding the continuation style

Promises

• Limitations of the call-back model of design
• Understanding a JS promise
• Using promises
• Promise chain
• Usage of .then() and .catch()
• How to convert a function taking a call-back into a function returning a promise

Async Functions

• Similarity between a promise-chain and a try-catch block
• Async functions in ES2017
• Using async and await
• Async lambda
• Using await in a loop
• Top-level await in ES2020

4 - Emitters and Streams

Event Emitters

• What is an event emitter in Node?
• Event types and listeners
• Emitter definition
• Simple emitter
• Receive events
• Receive an event just once
• Dealing with event errors

Buffers

• What is a Node buffer?
• Allocating a buffer
• Usage of a buffer
• Slicing a buffer
• Encodings

Streams

• What is a Node stream?
• Using .pipe()
• Stream types
• Implementing a Readable
• Implementing a Writable
• Implementing a stream transformer
• Assembly of stream pipeline
• The LineTransformer
• The SplitTransformer
• The Array2ObjectTransformer
• The JsonArrayTransformer
• Useful helper libraries

5 - CORE API

Working with Processes

• Child processes in Node
• Using execFile()
• Using exec()
• Using spawn()
• Using fork() and send messages
• Handling POSIX signals
• Sending signals

Working with Files

• The fs module
• List of functions with Linux similarities
• Promised based functions
• The path module
• POSIX error codes
• Different ways writing to stdout

HTTP Server

• List of built-in network services
• A simple HTTP server
• Serving files
• A simple REST WS server

HTTP Client

• Simple GET request
• Handling errors
• Simple POST request, sending data

6 - SELECTED FRAMEWORKS

Unit Testing with Jest

• Installation and configuration
• Jest and ESM and how to make it work
• Writing a test function
• Test suite execution
• Understanding matchers
• User-defined matcher
• Testing exceptions
• Testing async code
• Test code coverage
• Life-cycle functions

HTTP Client with Fetch

• Why use a 3rd party lib for HTTP client access?
• Installation and configuration of node-fetch
• Simple GET request
• Performing non-GET requests
• Sending data
• Simple CRUD REST sequence
• Using json-server

HTTP Server with Express

• Why use a 3rd party lib for HTTP server provisioning
• Installation and configuration
• Simple Express app
• Understanding app components
• Defining routes
• Defining filters
• Defining middlewares
• Simple HTML/CSS/JS based web app using Express
• Template engines
• Implementation of a simple template engine
• Using the Express generator
• Simple REST WS server with CRUD operations

Using a MySQL Database

• Installation och configuration of mysql2
• Connecting to a MySQL server
• How to create and drop tables
• How to perform basic CRUD operations
• An Express app using Handlebars template and engine and a MySQL database
• Brief about installing MySQL
• Installing and using MySQL using a Docker container

7 - Tools

Transpilers

• What is a transpiler?
• JavaScript transpilers
• Installation and usage of Babel
• HTML transpilers
• Usage of Pug
• CSS transpilers
• Usage of SCSS
• Post-processors
• Minification

Builders

• What is a build tool?
• Using Gulp

Bundlers

• What is a bundler?
• Typical operations of a bundler
• Popular bundlers
• Using Parcel
• Using Vite