How routing in Express.js/Node.js web app? - javascript

I'm working on this web app that include several pages.
I really would know if it's better handle the router in the backend (Node.js) or in the frontend (React.js) or with both (I didn't understand in the Internet).
For example, how have I to work with the login page (that will re-direct on the user area).
Thanks

I don't know how big your project is, or its requirements, but if this is a personal project I would suggest using the React Router Library. You can make a call to your Express app from the Front, and based on the response you get back you can route the user to wherever.
In a project of mine I had an express route for login that looked for the user in a database, then checked to see if they provided the correct password. If the user provided the wrong password or if the account wasn't found I sent back an error message. If the user provided the right password I sent a success message to the front. I would listen for the response on the frontend, if I received a success message, I would call useNavigate from React Router to route the user to the user page.
Here is the documentation for React Router Dom: https://www.npmjs.com/package/react-router-dom
If this is a bigger project and you need to think about accessibility and search engine optimization, you would have to find a way to render React from the backend. Its called server side rendering, which I'm not familiar with.
Hope this helps a little.

Related

How to mix SSR with CSR?

I have a very little knowledge about SSR.
Currently, I have two servers. I have built a CSR Single Page App using React on one server and backend on Nodejs + express on another server. My app has a login page.
How can I move my existing Login component logic to SSR and after successfull login all other components must work from CSR. I don't know how to achieve this goal.
Do I need to turn my CSR react app server into SSR by using something like Nextjs and the backend nodejs server should continue to operate like before?
Or do I need to use SSR logic on my backend Nodejs server?
Or do I need to migrate my whole CSR react app into SSR? Then do i still need backend nodejs server?
I might sound confusing asking this question. Please let me know if i need to explain it a bit further.
You will use just one NodeJS + Express server. You define some regular endpoint routes to provide things like login functionality, signup and so on. But also a "catch-all" route at the end where you will render your react app to a string via node and send it back to the browser as HTML.
Not too long ago I did a very basic SSR example using typescript and react. I hope this will be helpful!
https://github.com/akimthedream/server-side-rendered-typescript-react

node express react oauth pass access token after athorization in callback with react client app

I have a node server that authenticates with a third party (like stack overflow does) using oauth. When the third party hits my callback and I authorize the request and get the access token and other info, I want to then pass this info to a react app I made, so then the react app can make REST calls to using the access token straight from the provider.
I am new to react and node, but am able to make a node server that can get the access and refresh token info. I am new to 'serving' and serving a react app. I have been serving using
app.use('/client', express.static(__dirname + '/client'));
to serve react apps, and this works great to a limited extent. The situation I am currently in exceeds the extent and I want to learn how to send the oauth info along with my react app back after authorizing in the callback. The flow I am using authorizes the request in the callback and then does a redirect back to the /client route to render the app, which fails to pass any oauth info to the client. Is there any way to set the header before that redirect to have the oauth info, and then some how get that oauth info in the react app?
I am posting here to get some advice on some avenues and resources I should read up on, and maybe some suggestions for my current situation. I am eager to learn more on express and am currently looking to set the header with the info I need and then serving the react app as a file or something, I am not sure yet.
Thanks to all in advanced!
I'll give my best to answer your question. So the problem with SPA(Single Page Application) and OAuth login is that the only way to transfer data with redirects is URL query string. The JWT(JSON Web Token) would allow this, but it's only supported in mobile native SDK-s. Solution for the web, without using the popover flows here:
For Node.js I suggest to use Passport.js OAuth modules, the login flow:
Example /auth/google -> redirect to Google login page.
On success, you get redirected back to callback url /auth/google/callback
You also get back the access_token, refresh_token, basic profile information etc.
No sessions are used so we use the JWT and generate the token on server side.
Redirect back to application with the token: app.example.com?token=JASJKDk..
On client side extract the token from query string.
This is just one possible flow that you might use, instead of JWT you could also use session/cookie solution.

Single Page App w/ Login Page

I have been doing some research on this topic but can never find anything super relevant. I am looking to create a single page application using Polymer. I am building this around a REST API that requires authentication to view is resources.
I have all the details with API worked out but I can't seem to figure out how to handle a login page. Basically what is the best way to keep a user from seeing content without being logged into the application?
Obviously the REST API won't allow data to return to the client but how do I go about preventing a user from going into DevTools and changing some boolean values and being able to navigate through all of the pages, and receiving the 401 errors from all of the Ajax requests trying to fire?
I appreciate any help that I can get! Thanks!
You can't prevent users from changing stuff in DevTools. Just ensure on the server that the user doesn't get data or isn't able to pass data without being authenticated.
Issue a token when the user passes username and password and on the server allow only what the user assigned to this token is allowed to do.
See for example https://stormpath.com/blog/build-secure-user-interfaces-using-jwts/

Non angular landing page with authentification and angular app routing / redirection

I searched a lot in here, and i couldnt find an answer to the questions I ask myself. Here is the thing :
On one side , I want to have a static landing page (with login/sign up form ), and on the other side, I have an angular app that handles all the things related to the authenticated user. It's like that because my app is kind of "private", so users that cant register or login do not have to load the entire angular app and can't go further than the landing.
On the landing page, the login request hits on my API, and with the given credentials I store the user access token in the local storage, which allows him to do all the future requests inside the angular app.
What I want to do is to have the same URL for both the landing and the angular app. Let's say the base url is www.myproject.com, when I go to this url, depending on if i'm logged or not, i want to be redirected to the landing page or the angular app. It's also based on a "Remember me" checkbox.
So how do I do to share www.myproject.com between the landing and the angular app, depending on the user state ( logged or not ) ? Is it some kind of server routing ? Or can I achieved this with angular ui-router ?
It's only a matter of fanciness, i could also have urls like www.myproject.com for the landing, and www.myproject.com/app for the angular app, but the real problem here is how to do the logged/not logged based routing. If it simpler to explain with two differents urls, I'm interested too.
Thank you for your answers, i feel really lost here !
EDIT
Since ALL the requests inside the angular app need the access token, what if I catch 401 error that i might get from oAuth when entering the angular app, with an http interceptor ? Could I use this to redirect to my external landing page file ?
I don't really need the share of the root url between the landing and the app, all I want to know is : is catching 401 code a good way to redirect to the landing/login page ?

Single page application with login and search robots

In my work with a Javascript single page application, i have recently run into a problem.
The whole idea behind this project, is to avoid page reload. When the user comes to my application they won't need to make any reloads. This is done with jQuery and Backbone.js and PHP as service.
I have this static index.html file, where i hide my login container and application container. Then i show the login container, if the user is not recognize by my application, and if they have auth i show the application.
if auth:
application.show()
elif not auth:
login.show() // like Gmail or Facebook etc.: Information + login-form
I wan't to show users who aren't authenticated, both login-form and general info. Very important is also that the site can be found by robots as Google etc.
Can this only be done with 2 different files, giving me reload? A site.com and login.site.com. That solution irritates me, because my login, as it is by now, is quite instant.
Not sure I get the question completely but if you want to check if a user in authenticated, try to do an ajax call. If it fails with "401 unauthorized" the user needs to login...
You can achieve what you want by using ajax calls to authenticate (Although this is not a recommended approach, and people usually prefer the two page solution you have outlined).
What you can do, is have very skinny controllers that just exist to provide data to rich client UI.
Your gateway controller(A separate controller, with no model that acts as an entry point in the application) will just render the basic application structure to the client (without any user specific data, you dont know if the user is logged in, you dont need to know at this point). Then the client will query the UserController for identity of currently logged in user, if user is logged in server returns a json response containing information related to user and if not, server returns a response saying that user is not logged in. Then you can fetch a partial for the login form and then submit it again through ajax. As you see, creating the UI once and communicating with the server with lightweight ajax calls can solve your issue easily.

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