Running a node express server using webpack-dev-server

Solution 1:

Webpack-dev-server is great for client side development but it will not deploy Express api's or middleware. So in development I recommend running two separate servers: One for the client and one for your server side api's.

Nodemon npm install --save-dev nodemon is a good backend development server that will give you hot-redeploy of your api's, or you can just use express and restart when you make changes. In production the client and api will still be served by the same express server.

Set a lifecycle event for both nodemon and webpack-dev-server in your package.json to make starting them easy (example: npm run dev-server).

"scripts": {
   "start": "webpack --progress --colors",
   "dev-server": "nodemon ./server.js localhost 8080",
   "dev-client": "webpack-dev-server --port 3000",
}

Or, to run express directly from node:

"scripts": {
   "start": "webpack --progress --colors",
   "dev-server": "node dev-server.js",
   "dev-client": "webpack-dev-server --port 3000",
}

// dev-server.js
const express = require('express');
const app = express();
// Import routes
require('./_routes')(app);   // <-- or whatever you do to include your API endpoints and middleware
app.set('port', 8080);
app.listen(app.get('port'), function() {
    console.log('Node App Started');
});

Note: The api server must use a different port than webpack-dev-server.

And finally in your webpack-dev-config you need to use a proxy to redirect calls to your api to the new port:

devServer: {
  historyApiFallback: true,
  hot: true,
  inline: true,

  host: 'localhost', // Defaults to `localhost`
  port: 3000, // Defaults to 8080
  proxy: {
    '^/api/*': {
      target: 'http://localhost:8080/api/',
      secure: false
    }
  }
},
// and separately, in your plugins section
plugins: [
  new webpack.HotModuleReplacementPlugin({
    multiStep: true
  })
]

**Bonus points for having a single script to start and kill both

Solution 2:

Since webpack-dev-server is just a tiny express server with compile on change and hot reload.

So, if you already got a express server for backend API, just merge the compile on change and hot reload into your express server.

Then after take a look at the package.json of webpack-dev-server, i find the key is just webpack-dev-middleware

const express = require('express'); //your original BE server
const app = express();

const webpack = require('webpack');
const middleware = require('webpack-dev-middleware'); //webpack hot reloading middleware
const compiler = webpack({ .. webpack options .. }); //move your `devServer` config from `webpack.config.js`


app.use(middleware(compiler, {
  // webpack-dev-middleware options
}));

app.listen(3000, () => console.log('Example app listening on port 3000!'))

So, when you run your BE server, it will compile all the things using webpack, and watch for changes, LOL ~

Also, add webpack-hot-middleware for hot reloading function, see Hot Module Replacement