Nodemon server with axios - Unable to Send

Question

I have a React app and within this app a folder called backend. This folder contains 2 files:

Config contains a variable with email and password through nodemailer. Index.js (which is what my server is supposed to run) has this:

const path = require("path");
const express = require("express");
const transporter = require("./config");
const dotenv = require("dotenv");
dotenv.config();
const app = express();

const buildPath = path.join(__dirname, "..", "build");
app.use(express.json());
app.use(express.static(buildPath));

app.post("/send", (req, res) => {
  try {
    const mailOptions = {
      from: req.body.email, // sender address
      to: process.env.email, // list of receivers
      subject: req.body.subject, // Subject line
      html: `
      <p>You have a new contact request.</p>
      <h3>Contact Details</h3>
      <ul>
        <li>Name: ${req.body.name}</li>
        <li>Email: ${req.body.email}</li>
        <li>Subject: ${req.body.subject}</li>
        <li>Message: ${req.body.message}</li>
      </ul>
      `,
    };

    transporter.sendMail(mailOptions, function (err, info) {
      if (err) {
        res.status(500).send({
          success: false,
          message: "Something went wrong. Try again later",
        });
      } else {
        res.send({
          success: true,
          message: "Thanks for contacting us. We will get back to you shortly",
        });
      }
    });
  } catch (error) {
    res.status(500).send({
      success: false,
      message: "Something went wrong. Try again later",
    });
  }
});

app.listen(3030, () => {
  console.log("server start on port 3030");
});

Then, within a different folder (components) I have a component file that takes the form information and it's supposed to take it to the server:

import React, { useState } from "react";
import axios from "axios";
import { Form, Button } from "react-bootstrap";
import Navbar from "../components/Navbar";
import BottomNav from "../components/BottomNav";

const Contact = () => {
  const [state, setState] = useState({
    name: "",
    email: "",
    subject: "",
    message: "",
  });

  const [result, setResult] = useState(null);

  const sendEmail = event => {
    event.preventDefault();
    axios
      .post("/send", { ...state })
      .then(response => {
        setResult(response.data);
        setState({
          name: "",
          email: "",
          subject: "",
          message: "",
        });
      })
      .catch(() => {
        setResult({
          success: false,
          message: "Something went wrong. Try again later",
        });
      });
  };

  const onInputChange = event => {
    const { name, value } = event.target;

    setState({
      ...state,
      [name]: value,
    });
  };

  return (
    <div>
      <Navbar />
      {result && (
        <p className={`${result.success ? "success" : "error"}`}>
          {result.message}
        </p>
      )}
      <form
        className="phs-form-wrapper mt-8 h-screen flex flex-col items-center "
        onSubmit={sendEmail}
      >
        <Form.Group
          className=" phs-form-group flex flex-col items-center"
          controlId="name"
        >
          <Form.Label className="phs-form-label mr-2">Full Name</Form.Label>
          <Form.Control
            type="text"
            name="name"
            value={state.name}
            onChange={onInputChange}
          />
        </Form.Group>
        <Form.Group
          className=" phs-form-group flex flex-col items-center"
          controlId="email"
        >
          <Form.Label className="phs-form-label mr-2">Email</Form.Label>
          <Form.Control
            type="text"
            name="email"
            value={state.email}
            onChange={onInputChange}
          />
        </Form.Group>
        <Form.Group
          className=" phs-form-group flex flex-col items-center"
          controlId="subject"
        >
          <Form.Label className="phs-form-label mr-2">Subject</Form.Label>
          <Form.Control
            type="text"
            name="subject"
            value={state.subject}
            onChange={onInputChange}
          />
        </Form.Group>
        <Form.Group
          className=" phs-form-group flex flex-col items-center"
          controlId="subject"
        >
          <Form.Label className="phs-form-label mr-2">Message</Form.Label>
          <Form.Control
            as="textarea"
            name="message"
            value={state.message}
            rows="3"
            onChange={onInputChange}
          />
        </Form.Group>
        <Button
          className="phs-form-submit-button bg-black text-white p-4 mt-4"
          variant="primary"
          type="submit"
        >
          Submit
        </Button>
      </form>
      <BottomNav />
    </div>
  );
};

export default Contact;

I am getting an error on both servers. On localhost:3000 which is where I run my react app whenever I try to submit the info I get a:

VM635:1 POST http://localhost:3000/send 404 (Not Found)

On localhost:3030:

GET http://localhost:3030/ 404 (Not Found)
localhost/:1 Refused to load the image 'http://localhost:3030/favicon.ico' because it violates the following Content Security Policy directive: "default-src 'none'". Note that 'img-src' was not explicitly set, so 'default-src' is used as a fallback.

I note that my axios has a .post("/send") but I tried to change this to localhost:3030/send and doesn't work either.

Additionally I have 2 package.json files, one within my react folder (web) and another one within my backend folder.

The backend one has a script like this:

"scripts": {
    "dev": "nodemon src/index.js"
  }

The web one has a different script so I run a different server:

"scripts": {
    "start": "npm run watch:css && react-scripts start",
    "build": "npm run watch:css && react-scripts build",
    "test": "react-scripts test",
    "eject": "react-scripts eject",
    "watch:css": "postcss src/assets/tailwind.css -o src/assets/main.css"
  }

Any ideas?

Answer 1

When you're running both the backend and frontend servers on different ports (:3000 and :3030 in this case), you need to particularly mention the whole url in axios call. In this case, /send is considered as http://localhost:3000 where the POST method doesn't exists (The reason why you're getting 404). You must make the following axios call:

const sendEmail = event => {
    event.preventDefault();
    axios
      .post("http://localhost:3030/send", state, {
        headers: { 
         'Access-Control-Allow-Origin' : '*'
        },
      })
      .then(response => {
        ...
      })
      .catch(() => {
        ...
      });
  };

Also you don't need to spread the state in axios call. The reason is axios call accepts second argument as object.

Answer 2

On your react app try sending it to "http://localhost:3030/send" instead "/send". I believe its because your server URL and your react dev server URL are different when you run it locally