How to run Node.js server in Ionic mobile app?

Question

I am making an app using MEAN and ionic framework where nodejs is a middleware to connect to the database(mongoDb). I need to run the nodejs server using node server.js and the app using ionic serve . This is my server.js.

var express          = require('express'),
app              = express(),
bodyParser       = require('body-parser'),
mongoose         = require('mongoose'),
CohortController =require('./www/server/controller/CohortController');

mongoose.connect('mongodb://localhost:27017/persistent');

app.use(bodyParser());

app.get('/api/cohorts',CohortController.list);
app.post('/api/cohorts',CohortController.create);

app.listen(3000,function(){
console.log('Listening...');
})

Now this is my app.js. I use http://localhost:3000 to get the JSON.

 app.controller('CohortController',['$scope','$resource', function($scope,$resource){ var Cohort=$resource('http://localhost:3000/api/cohorts'); Cohort.query(function(results){ $scope.cohorts=results; }); $scope.cohorts=[]; $scope.createCohort= function () { var cohort=new Cohort(); cohort.name=$scope.CohortName; cohort.id=$scope.CohortId; cohort.$save(function(result){ $scope.cohorts.push(result); $scope.CohortName=''; $scope.CohortId=''; }); } }]); 

How can I run the node server when I convert it into a mobile application? How the application will use the API?

Answer 1

You will have to have your Node.js app running on a server which you would then access (from your Ionic app) via it's public IP. So, you wouldn't use http://localhost:3000 to get the JSON, instead you would use something like http://123.456.789.123:3000 .

But, usually, this is not the way you would do it (with the port 3000). What you would additionally do is put (for example) Nginx in front of your Node.js app ( see an example here ) in order to serve your api from the standard HTTP port (80).

So, basically, you can't actually "run Node.js server in Ionic app" - the way you do it is run the Node.js app separate from Ionic and expose its functionality via a standardized API (usually these days REST is what you would want to achieve) which you then "consume" via Ionic's (well, to be exact, it's actually Angular's) $resource module .

Hope this helps clear things up a bit.