[node.js] static files with express.js

I want to serve index.html and /media subdirectory as static files. The index file should be served both at /index.html and / URLs.

I have

web_server.use("/media", express.static(__dirname + '/media'));
web_server.use("/", express.static(__dirname));

but the second line apparently serves the entire __dirname, including all files in it (not just index.html and media), which I don't want.

I also tried

web_server.use("/", express.static(__dirname + '/index.html'));

but accessing the base URL / then leads to a request to web_server/index.html/index.html (double index.html component), which of course fails.

Any ideas?

By the way, I could find absolutely no documentation in Express on this topic (static() + its params)... frustrating. A doc link is also welcome.

const path = require('path');

const express = require('express');

const app = new express();
app.use(express.static('/media'));

app.get('/', (req, res) => {
    res.sendFile(path.resolve(__dirname, 'media/page/', 'index.html'));
});

app.listen(4000, () => {
    console.log('App listening on port 4000')
})

npm install serve-index

var express    = require('express')
var serveIndex = require('serve-index')
var path = require('path')
var serveStatic = require('serve-static')
var app = express()
var port = process.env.PORT || 3000;
/**for files */
app.use(serveStatic(path.join(__dirname, 'public')));
/**for directory */
app.use('/', express.static('public'), serveIndex('public', {'icons': true}))

// Listen
app.listen(port,  function () {
  console.log('listening on port:',+ port );
})

If you have a complicated folder structure, such as

- Your application
     - assets
         - images
             - profile.jpg
     - web
     - server
        - index.js

If you want to serve assets/images from index.js

app.use('/images', express.static(path.join(__dirname, '..', 'assets', 'images')))

To view from your browser

http://localhost:4000/images/profile.jpg

If you need more clarification comment, I'll elaborate.

In the newest version of express the "createServer" is deprecated. This example works for me:

var express = require('express');
var app = express();
var path = require('path');

//app.use(express.static(__dirname)); // Current directory is root
app.use(express.static(path.join(__dirname, 'public'))); //  "public" off of current is root

app.listen(80);
console.log('Listening on port 80');

If you have this setup

/app
   /public/index.html
   /media

Then this should get what you wanted

var express = require('express');
//var server = express.createServer();
// express.createServer()  is deprecated. 
var server = express(); // better instead
server.configure(function(){
  server.use('/media', express.static(__dirname + '/media'));
  server.use(express.static(__dirname + '/public'));
});

server.listen(3000);

The trick is leaving this line as last fallback

  server.use(express.static(__dirname + '/public'));

As for documentation, since Express uses connect middleware, I found it easier to just look at the connect source code directly.

For example this line shows that index.html is supported https://github.com/senchalabs/connect/blob/2.3.3/lib/middleware/static.js#L140

res.sendFile & express.static both will work for this

var express = require('express');
var app = express();
var path = require('path');
var public = path.join(__dirname, 'public');

// viewed at http://localhost:8080
app.get('/', function(req, res) {
    res.sendFile(path.join(public, 'index.html'));
});

app.use('/', express.static(public));

app.listen(8080);

Where public is the folder in which the client side code is

As suggested by @ATOzTOA and clarified by @Vozzie, path.join takes the paths to join as arguments, the + passes a single argument to path.

use below inside your app.js

app.use(express.static('folderName'));

(folderName is folder which has files) - remember these assets are accessed direct through server path (i.e. http://localhost:3000/abc.png (where as abc.png is inside folderName folder)