Resource-based URL design in Express - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Resource-based URL Design with Express

📖 Scenario: You are building a simple web server for a library. The server will manage books and authors using resource-based URLs.

🎯 Goal: Create an Express server with routes that follow resource-based URL design principles for books and authors.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create an Express app instance called app

Define a route to get all books at /books

Define a route to get a single book by id at /books/:id

Define a route to get all authors at /authors

Define a route to get a single author by id at /authors/:id

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Web servers often use resource-based URLs to organize data access clearly and predictably, like accessing books or authors by their IDs.

💼 Career

Understanding resource-based URL design and Express routing is essential for backend web development roles.

1

Set up Express app

Create a variable called express by requiring the 'express' module. Then create an Express app instance called app by calling express().

Express

const express = require('express');
// Your code here

Need a hint?

Use require('express') to import Express and then call it to create the app.

2

Add configuration for port

Create a constant called PORT and set it to 3000.

Express

const express = require('express');
const app = express();
// Your code here

Need a hint?

Use const PORT = 3000; to set the port number.

3

Define resource-based routes

Add four routes to the app:

• GET /books that sends 'List of books'
• GET /books/:id that sends 'Book details for id: ' plus the id parameter
• GET /authors that sends 'List of authors'
• GET /authors/:id that sends 'Author details for id: ' plus the id parameter

Express

const express = require('express');
const app = express();
const PORT = 3000;
// Your code here

Need a hint?

Use app.get with the exact URL paths and send the specified text responses.

4

Start the server

Add code to start the server by calling app.listen with PORT and a callback that sends 'Server running on port ' plus the PORT.

Express

const express = require('express');
const app = express();
const PORT = 3000;

app.get('/books', (req, res) => {
  res.send('List of books');
});

app.get('/books/:id', (req, res) => {
  res.send(`Book details for id: ${req.params.id}`);
});

app.get('/authors', (req, res) => {
  res.send('List of authors');
});

app.get('/authors/:id', (req, res) => {
  res.send(`Author details for id: ${req.params.id}`);
});
// Your code here

Need a hint?

Use app.listen(PORT, () => { ... }) to start the server and log the message.