Express.js Starter Kit

A production-ready Express.js starter kit with Winston logging, Redis caching, and Socket.io real-time communication.

Features

• ✅ Express.js 4.x
• ✅ Winston - Structured logging with daily rotation
• ✅ Redis - Caching with ioredis client
• ✅ Socket.io - Real-time bidirectional communication
• ✅ Security middleware (Helmet, CORS)
• ✅ Request logging (Morgan → Winston)
• ✅ Graceful shutdown handling
• ✅ Environment configuration (dotenv)

Project Structure

├── src/
│   ├── config/           # Configuration files
│   ├── controllers/      # Route controllers
│   ├── middleware/       # Custom middleware (cache, errorHandler)
│   ├── routes/           # API routes
│   ├── services/         # Business services (Redis)
│   ├── socket/           # Socket.io manager
│   ├── utils/            # Utilities (logger)
│   └── index.js          # App entry point
├── logs/                 # Log files (auto-generated)
├── .env.example
├── .gitignore
├── package.json
└── README.md

Getting Started

Prerequisites

• Node.js 22+ (LTS)
• Redis server running

Installation

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Create environment file
cp .env.example .env

# Start Redis (if using Docker)
docker run -d -p 6379:6379 redis:alpine

# Start development server
npm run dev

API Endpoints

Method	Endpoint	Description
GET	/health	Health check with service status
GET	/api	API info
GET	/socket/stats	Socket.io statistics
GET/POST/PUT/DELETE	/api/users	User CRUD with Redis caching

Socket.io Events

Default Namespace (/)

Event	Direction	Description
join:room	Client → Server	Join a room
leave:room	Client → Server	Leave a room
message:private	Client → Server	Send private message
message:room	Client → Server	Send room message
message:receive	Server → Client	Receive message
typing:start/stop	Client → Server	Typing indicators

Custom Namespaces

• /notifications - For pub/sub notifications
• /chat - For chat functionality

Client Example

import { io } from 'socket.io-client';

const socket = io('http://localhost:3000', {
  auth: { token: 'your-token' }
});

socket.on('connect', () => {
  console.log('Connected:', socket.id);
  socket.emit('join:room', 'general', (response) => {
    console.log('Joined room:', response);
  });
});

socket.on('message:receive', (data) => {
  console.log('Message:', data);
});

Logging

Logs are written to logs/ directory:

• combined-YYYY-MM-DD.log - All logs
• error-YYYY-MM-DD.log - Error logs only
• exceptions-YYYY-MM-DD.log - Uncaught exceptions

Scripts

• npm run dev - Start with hot reload
• npm start - Production start
• npm test - Run tests

License

MIT