⚫ SETTING UP YOUR NODEJS PROJECT
Or you can download the Project Setup from my GitHub repo
🌓 TERMINOLOGIES USED
- Model: A Mongoose model provides an interface to the database for creating, querying, updating, deleting records, etc. -FCC
- Schema: A Mongoose schema defines the structure of the document, default values, validators, etc. -FCC
- Mongoose: Mongoose is an object data modeling (ODM) library that provides a rigorous modeling environment for your data, enforcing structure as needed while still maintaining the flexibility that makes MongoDB powerful -DevCenter
🌕 STEP 1 of 3
- Open your terminal and make sure it's navigated to the Project Folder
- Enter the command below in the terminal to install the
MongooseandEJSmodules
>> npm i mongoose ejs
- In your
index.jsfile, require the mongoose module, and also create a variable that'll hold the database connection url
const mongoose = require("mongoose")
var connectionUrl = "mongodb://localhost:27017/databasename"
- Still in the
index.jsfile, Establish a connection using the connection url
mongoose.connect(connectionUrl, {useNewUrlParser: true, useUnifiedTopology: true}, (err)=>{
if(err) throw err
console.log("Connected")
})
🎯Summary of index.js file:
const express = require('express')
const app = express()
const mongoose = require("mongoose")
var connectionUrl = "mongodb://localhost:27017/databasename"
mongoose.connect(connectionUrl, {useNewUrlParser: true, useUnifiedTopology: true}, (err)=>{
if(err) throw err
console.log("Connected")
})
app.get("/home", (req, res)=>{
res.send("Hello")
})
const port = process.env.PORT || 4000
app.listen(port, ()=>{
console.log(`Listening to Port ${port}`)
})
🌕 STEP 2 of 3
- Create a new folder
models
- In the models folder, create a
user.jsfile - The following steps will be done in the
user.jsfile:
📌 Require the mongoose module
const mongoose = require("mongoose")
📌 Create a Schema variable and assign it the Schema class from mongoose
const Schema = mongoose.Schema
📌 Instantiate the Schema class and pass in your document structure as an argument to the schema class
const UserSchema = new Schema({
firstname: {
type: String,
required: [true, "Firstname is required"]
},
lastname: {
type: String,
required: [true, "Lastname is required"]
}
})
📌 Create a mongoose model with the preffered name of your collection and the UserSchema created above
const UserModel = mongoose.model("user", UserSchema)
// The String "user" above is the name of your collection
📌 Export the model
module.exports = UserModel
🎯Summary of user.js file:
const mongoose = require('mongoose');
const Schema = mongoose.Schema
const UserSchema = new Schema({
firstname: {
type: String,
required: [true, "Firstname is required"]
},
lastname: {
type: String,
required: [true, "Lastname is required"]
}
})
const UserModel = mongoose.model("user", UserSchema)
module.exports = UserModel
🌕 STEP 3 of 3
- Create a new folder
views
- In the views folder, create an
index.ejsfile
- Create a simple html form in the
index.ejsfile with the method attribute set to POST and the action attribute set to/api/user
<html>
<body>
<form method="POST" action="/api/user">
<label for="">Firstname</label>
<input type="text" name="firstname" id=""><br>
<label for="">Lastname</label>
<input type="text" name="lastname" id=""><br>
<input type="submit">
</form>
</body>
</html>
- The following steps will be done in the
index.jsfile:
📌 Create a body parsing middleware with the built in express body-parser in order to populate the req.body with our inputs
app.use(express.urlencoded({extended: true}))
📌 Set the view engine to ejs
app.set("view engine", "ejs")
📌 Create a route for displaying the html form we created
app.get("/index", (req, res)=>{
res.render("index")
})
📌 Import the userModel from the models folderImport the userModel from the models folder
const UserModel = require("./models/user")
📌 Create a route/endpoint for collecting and sending the user inputs to our Mongo DataBase
app.post("/api/user", (req, res)=>{
})
📌 In the endpoint, Instantiate the UserModel and pass the req.body as an argument.
const SaveUser = new UserModel(req.body)
Note: The req.body holds the user inputs sent from the form.
📌 Save the UserInput to your database by adding the following lines of code to the endpoint:
SaveUser.save((error, savedUser)=>{
if(error) throw error
res.json(savedUser)
NOTE: The conditions in the save method is simply saying: If an error is encountered, throw the error. But if there is no error, return the saved user details.
🎯Updated Summary of index.js file:
const express = require('express')
const app = express()
const mongoose = require("mongoose")
const UserModel = require("./models/user")
var connectionUrl = "mongodb://localhost:27017/dbname"
mongoose.connect(connectionUrl, {useNewUrlParser: true, useUnifiedTopology: true}, (err)=>{
if(err) throw err
console.log("Connected")
})
app.use(express.urlencoded({extended: true}))
app.set("view engine", "ejs")
app.get("/home", (req, res)=>{
res.render("index")
})
app.post("/api/user", (req, res)=>{
const SaveUser = new UserModel(req.body)
SaveUser.save((error, savedUser)=>{
if(error) throw error
res.json(savedUser)
})
})
app.listen(9000, ()=>{
console.log("listening to port 9000")
})
Latest comments (4)
It showing error of UserModel is not a constructor.Please help to get out of this..
Macaulay,
Thank you so much for taking the time to post this. It was everything I was looking for to solve my misunderstanding. You are awesome!
Please review this your code especially in the index.js. It didn't work.
Thank you for sharing