devservr

Webserver for quick development of single page apps with live-reload and dynamic routes

Install

npm install -g devservr

Usage

Command line tool

devservr [port] [basepath] [routesfile]

• port: port to Server.listen. Defaults to 80
• basepath: root path for static files and also the path to watch for live-reload. Defaults to ./
• routesfile: a .json file with webserver routes. Defaults to ./routes.json (if exists) then devservr/etc/routes.json

Parameters can be passed in any order, as long as routes.json ends with ".json"

As a module

var devservr = require('devservr')
devservr.run({port:[port], basepath:[basepath], routesfile:[routesfile]})

Live-reload

All .html and .htm files will auto reload when any change inside basepath is detected.

How it works?

A small javascript code snippet will be dynamically inserted before the </body>. This script will manage page reloads.

Routes

Exact routes

Routes with exact match.

"/test" : "/test/test.html"

Example: http://localhost/test will serve file /test/test.html

Variable routes

URLs with variables.

"/product/:id" : "/product.html"

Path /product with any :id will match to /product.html. Single page app frontend should work with the id to do something

Example: http://localhost/product/123 will serve file /product.html

Automatic routes

Routes that will serve files from disc if the path part of the URL is the same as the path of a static file

Example: http://localhost/test.html will automatically try to serve file ./test.html from disc, if it exists

The */ route

Default file for paths that point to a directory

"*/": "index.html"

Example: http://localhost/ will automatically try to serve file ./index.html from disc, if it exists

The * route

This will be the "else" route if every other route fails to match and there is no static file on disc with that path. Usually a 404 not found page.

"*": "404.html"

Example: http://localhost/notFound will not find any route nor file on disc for 'notFound' then will serve ./404.html

Default routes.json

This basic routes.json will be used if none is provided

{
    "*/" : "index.html",
    "*" : "notfound.html"
}

Example

1. Create a new project mkdir myproject && cd myproject
2. Create a .html, add your code, save, exit
3. Install devservr npm install -g devservr
4. Run ./devservr
5. Open http://localhost/ on your browser
6. Edit a file, save, and watch it reload automatically

It'll work with all files on the base folder. If there is a <script src="myscript.js"> inside your index.html and myscript.js changes, then index.html will also reload.

Mime types

Mime types are at devservr/etc/mime.json

Disclaimer

Do not use devservr in production. All file reads are synchronous and not cached.

To-do

• directory listings
• routes should accept a status code as a response to make it easy to test REST services. { "/api/save" : 200 }
• looks like fs.watch on windows with {recursive:true} is not recursive. Triggers only on base path changes.