Starter project with ES6 + Express + Mongoose + JWT auth

This project aims to be a fast starter for NodeJS REST APIs, offering a pre-configured stack with clean code and simple logic. With this, in a matter of seconds you put an API up and running.

• ES6 (Babel)
• Express
• Mongoose ODM
• JWT auth (Passport.js)
• Loads environment variables from .env
• Nodemon for restarting when code changes
• ESLint + Prettier + Airbnb styles already set up
• Morgan for request logs

Getting started

First, you will need to have a up and running MongoDB server. Then, do as follows:

1. Clone this repo and cd into it.
2. Do yarn for installing dependencies.
3. Create a .env file like this:

   NODE_ENV = dev
   PORT = 3000
   MONGO_URL = mongodb://127.0.0.1:27017/yourdb
   JWT_SECRET = 2eKhpZ6QebcJwde7wgAr0ZJACwckK3UorHZlgCXc1oWowD3JUWKXxtUu4HxE9Er 
   

   There is a env_example file that you can just rename and edit. Note that MONGO_URL is the MongoDB connection string and JWT_SECRET is a secret for JWT tokens, that you should generate for each API. You can use https://www.grc.com/passwords.htm for generating the secret.
4. Then, to run, you have these commands:
   • yarn dev to start in dev mode, with auto refresh.
   • yarn build to generate a production optimized version.
   • yarn start to start the production optimized version.

Authentication

This project includes authentication using Passport.js that relies on Mongoose. To create a user, do a post request to /auth/register with params email and password. Then, a user will be created on database. To sign this user in, do a post request to /auth/login with params email and password, and the response will include a token, in JWT format. To authenticate routes, use passport.authenticate("jwt") as middleware on the router, like this:

router.get("/", passport.authenticate("jwt"), (req, res) => {
  return res.json(req.user);
});

or to have optional authentication on a route, use also the anonymous strategy, like this:

router.get("/", passport.authenticate(["jwt", "anonymous"]), (req, res) => {
  return res.json(req.user); // returns user if authenticated, or null if not
});

More details

In the project folder, inside src, you will find controllers and models. On controllers there is a index.js file that loads controllers from other files on the same folder, using it at the defined route. On models there is a index.js file that loads models on the same folder. To create a new model, you create a file on models and exports it from models/index.js. To create a new controller, you create a file on controllers import on controllers/index.js and load the route. In both cases, there is a user/auth model/controller that you can use as example.

Author

• Renan Galeno

License

MIT