static files with express.js

Question

I want to serve index.html and /media subdirectory as static files. The index file should be served both at /index.html and / URLs.

I have

web_server.use("/media", express.static(__dirname + '/media'));
web_server.use("/", express.static(__dirname));

but the second line apparently serves the entire __dirname, including all files in it (not just index.html and media), which I don't want.

I also tried

web_server.use("/", express.static(__dirname + '/index.html'));

but accessing the base URL / then leads to a request to web_server/index.html/index.html (double index.html component), which of course fails.

Any ideas?

---

By the way, I could find absolutely no documentation in Express on this topic (static() + its params)... frustrating. A doc link is also welcome.

Answer 1

If you have this setup

/app
   /public/index.html
   /media

Then this should get what you wanted

var express = require('express');
//var server = express.createServer();
// express.createServer()  is deprecated. 
var server = express(); // better instead
server.configure(function(){
  server.use('/media', express.static(__dirname + '/media'));
  server.use(express.static(__dirname + '/public'));
});

server.listen(3000);

The trick is leaving this line as last fallback

  server.use(express.static(__dirname + '/public'));

As for documentation, since Express uses connect middleware, I found it easier to just look at the connect source code directly.

For example this line shows that index.html is supported https://github.com/senchalabs/connect/blob/2.3.3/lib/middleware/static.js#L140

Answer 2

In the newest version of express the "createServer" is deprecated. This example works for me:

var express = require('express');
var app = express();
var path = require('path');

//app.use(express.static(__dirname)); // Current directory is root
app.use(express.static(path.join(__dirname, 'public'))); //  "public" off of current is root

app.listen(80);
console.log('Listening on port 80');

Answer 3

express.static() expects the first parameter to be a path of a directory, not a filename. I would suggest creating another subdirectory to contain your index.html and use that.

Serving static files in Express documentation, or more detailed serve-static documentation, including the default behavior of serving index.html:

By default this module will send “index.html” files in response to a request on a directory. To disable this set false or to supply a new index pass a string or an array in preferred order.

Answer 4

res.sendFile & express.static both will work for this

var express = require('express');
var app = express();
var path = require('path');
var public = path.join(__dirname, 'public');

// viewed at http://localhost:8080
app.get('/', function(req, res) {
    res.sendFile(path.join(public, 'index.html'));
});

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

app.listen(8080);

Where public is the folder in which the client side code is

As suggested by @ATOzTOA and clarified by @Vozzie, path.join takes the paths to join as arguments, the + passes a single argument to path.

Answer 5

const path = require('path');

const express = require('express');

const app = new express();
app.use(express.static('/media'));

app.get('/', (req, res) => {
    res.sendFile(path.resolve(__dirname, 'media/page/', 'index.html'));
});

app.listen(4000, () => {
    console.log('App listening on port 4000')
})

Answer 6

If you have a complicated folder structure, such as

- Your application
     - assets
         - images
             - profile.jpg
     - web
     - server
        - index.js

If you want to serve assets/images from index.js

app.use('/images', express.static(path.join(__dirname, '..', 'assets', 'images')))

To view from your browser

http://localhost:4000/images/profile.jpg

If you need more clarification comment, I'll elaborate.

Answer 7

npm install serve-index

var express    = require('express')
var serveIndex = require('serve-index')
var path = require('path')
var serveStatic = require('serve-static')
var app = express()
var port = process.env.PORT || 3000;
/**for files */
app.use(serveStatic(path.join(__dirname, 'public')));
/**for directory */
app.use('/', express.static('public'), serveIndex('public', {'icons': true}))

// Listen
app.listen(port,  function () {
  console.log('listening on port:',+ port );
})

Answer 8

use below inside your app.js

app.use(express.static('folderName'));

(folderName is folder which has files) - remember these assets are accessed direct through server path (i.e. http://localhost:3000/abc.png (where as abc.png is inside folderName folder)

Answer 9

I would add something that is on the express docs, and it's sometimes misread in tutorials or others.

app.use(mountpoint, middleware) 

mountpoint is a virtual path, it is not in the filesystem (even if it actually exists). The mountpoint for the middleware is the app.js folder.

Now

app.use('/static', express.static('public')`

will send files with path /static/hell/meow/a.js to /public/hell/meow/a.js

Answer 10

This is the error in my case when I provide links to HTML files.

before:

<link rel="stylesheet" href="/public/style.css">

After:

<link rel="stylesheet" href="/style.css">

I just removed the static directory path from the link and the error is gone. This solves my error one thing more don't forget to put this line where you are creating the server.

var path = require('path');
app.use(serveStatic(path.join(__dirname, 'public')));