Advanced Full-Stack Web Development Nanodegree Program - Building an API with Postgres and Express!

About The Project

• A RESTful JSON Node API backed by PostgreSQL database for a shopping website.

• The API offers several endpoints to access and manipulate data in a Postgres database through both CRUD and custom actions.

• PostgreSQL is the object-relational database management system.

• A detailed list of the endpoints and actions available can be found in the REQUIREMENTS.md file.

  • You can test them alive in the request.rest file.
    • download REST Client Extention => id: humao.rest-client.
    • Tap on Send Request button above every endpoint.
    • You're Welcome 🤝.

More About The Project...

• RESTful API that supports CRUD for all entities in the database.
• Connect to a Postgres database.
• Organized Express routes into handlers.
• Created Express functions for incoming requests.
• Mapped RESTful routes to model methods.
• Added endpoint tests.
• Available to the public using CORS.
• Secure.
• Passwords are stored hashed using the bcrypt package.
• Allow products to be created and stored in a database.
• Allow users to sign up and sign in.
• Allow users to login and register.
• Require users to be signed in to perform certain actions.
• Allow users to create orders and add products to orders.
• Added a cart.
• Every user can only update the data of himself.
• list the most common products/orders and limit the number of responses.

Functionalities - Features

• users
  • add a user
  • get all the users
  • get a specific user with uuid
  • update a user
    • Add a users 5 most recent purchases to the data being sent back from the user show endpoint (/users/uuid)
  • authenticate a user
  • delete a user
• products
  • add a product
  • get all the products
  • get a specific product with uuid
  • get all products by category
  • update a product
  • delete a product
• orders
  • add an order
  • get all of the orders
  • get a specific order
  • update the status of a specific order
  • add a product to a specific order
  • get all prodcuts of a specific order
  • delete a specific order
• dashboard
  • get all products that have been included in orders
  • get all users that have made orders
  • get the # most expensive products
  • get the most popular products
  • get the current order for a user
  • get the completed orders for a user

How to setup and connect to the database - Databases Configurations

We are using PostgreSQL as our object-relational database management system to deal with and manipulate databases.

Open the psql command-line tool:-

sudo su - postgres --> Switch to the postgres user 
psql postgres --> Start psql 

We need to make two databases:-

• store_dev : for development
• store_test : for testing

Run the following Queries:-

CREATE USER user_name WITH PASSWORD 'user_password'; 
CREATE DATABASE store_dev;
\c store_dev
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON DATABASE store_dev TO user_name;
CREATE DATABASE store_test;
\c store_test
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON DATABASE store_test TO user_name;

Create a .env file according to the .env.example file to set up the environment variables.

Create a database.json file like the following :-

{
    "defaultEnv": {"ENV": "NODE_ENV"},
    "dev": {
        "driver": "pg",
        "host": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_HOST"},
        "port": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_PORT"},
        "database": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_DB"},
        "user": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_USER"},
        "password": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_PASSWORD"}
    },
    "test": {
        "driver": "pg",
        "host": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_HOST"},
        "port": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_PORT"},
        "database": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_DB_TEST"},
        "user": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_USER"},
        "password": {"ENV": "POSTGRES_PASSWORD"}
    }
}

• Install the project's dependencies npm i.
• Run the mig:u script : To set up all the needed tables and their relationships
• Run the start script : To run the server
• Done 👐

what ports the backend and database are running on

They are running on the ports provided by the user in the .env file.

Usually i run them on the following ports:-

• The database is running on the port 5432
• The backend is running on the port 3000

Scripts

    npm i # To install all the dependencies needed for the project.

    npm run mig:u # To Call the up migrations.

    npm run mig:d # To call the down migrations.

    npm run mig:r # To reset all migrations.

    npm run build # To compile typescript.

    npm run start # To run the server.

    npm run dev # To run the server for development.

    npm run watch # To run the watcher.

    npm run format # To format the code.

    npm run lint # To accelerate development and reduce errors.

    npm run lint:fix # To fix developers errors.

    npm run test # To test the Project.

Technologies / Stack

• PostgreSQL.
• Node.js.
• Express.
• TypeScript.
• Jasmine.
• JavaScript.

Middlewares And Utilities

• cors
• express.json
• morgan
• helmet
• error.middleware
• authenticateToken
• rateLimit
• verifyAuthToken
• parseJWT
• genereateRandom
• hashPassword

Dependencies And Dev-Dependencies

• Prettier : for code formating.
• Eslint : for improving style and structure.
• dotenv : for managing environment variables.
• db-migrate : for migrations.
• pg : for connecting to a database.
• jsonwebtoken : for working with JWTs.
• jasmine : for test driven development.
• morgan : for logging incoming requests to the server.
• helment : for securing the server.
• express : for CORS and route handling.
• express.json : for parsing incoming requests.
• express-rate-limit : for limiting the number of requests to the server.
• bcrypt : for encrypting the passwords .
• jwt : for authorization.
• TypeScript : for reducing type errors.
• Supertest : for testing the api
• node : for coding the logic.
• nodemon : for auto running the server.