Angular - Creating Express Based REST API

The prerequisite for HTTP programming is a basic understanding of the HTTP protocol and REST API techniques. HTTP programming involves two parts: the server and the client. Angular provides support for creating client-side applications, while Express (a popular web framework) provides support for creating server-side applications.

Let us create anExpense Rest APIusing the express framework and then access it from ourExpenseManagerapplication using the Angular HttpClient service.

Open a command prompt and create a new folder, express-rest-api.

cd /go/to/workspace 
mkdir express-rest-api 
cd expense-rest-api

Initialize a new node application using the below command −

npm init

After running the npm init commond will ask some basic questions like project name (express-rest-API), entry point (server.js), etc., as mentioned below −

This utility will walk you through creating a package.json file. 
It only covers the most common items, and tries to guess sensible defaults. 
See 'npm help json' for definitive documentation on these fields and 
exactly what they do. 
Use 'npm install <pkg>' afterwards to install a package and save 
it as a dependency in the package.json file. 
Press ^C at any time to quit. 
package name: (expense-rest-api) 
version: (1.0.0) 
description: Rest api for Expense Application 
entry point: (index.js) server.js 
test command:
git repository: 
keywords: 
author: 
license: (ISC) 
About to write to \path\to\workspace\expense-rest-api\package.json: { 
   "name": "expense-rest-api", 
   "version": "1.0.0", 
   "description": "Rest api for Expense Application", 
   "main": "server.js", 
   "scripts": { 
      "test": "echo \"Error: no test specified\" && exit 1" 
   }, 
   "author": "", 
   "license": "ISC",
   "type": "commonjs"
} 
Is this OK? (yes) yes

Installexpress, SQLite, andcorsmodules using the below command −

npm install express sqlite3 cors

Create a new filewith the name sqlitedb.jsand place the below code −

sqlitedb.js

var sqlite3 = require('sqlite3').verbose()
const DBSOURCE = "expensedb.sqlite"

let db = new sqlite3.Database(DBSOURCE, (err) => {
   if (err) {
      console.error(err.message)
      throw err
   }else{
      console.log('Connected to the SQLite database.')
      db.run(`CREATE TABLE expense (
         id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY AUTOINCREMENT,
         item text, 
         amount real, 
         category text, 
         location text, 
         spendOn text, 
         createdOn text 
         )`,
            (err) => {
               if (err) {
                  console.log(err);
               }else{
                  var insert = 'INSERT INTO expense (item, amount, category, location, spendOn, createdOn) VALUES (?,?,?,?,?,?)'

                  db.run(insert, ['Pizza', 10, 'Food', 'KFC', '2020-05-26 10:10', '2020-05-26 10:10'])
                  db.run(insert, ['Pizza', 9, 'Food', 'Mcdonald', '2020-05-28 11:10', '2020-05-28 11:10'])
                  db.run(insert, ['Pizza', 12, 'Food', 'Mcdonald', '2020-05-29 09:22', '2020-05-29 09:22'])
                  db.run(insert, ['Pizza', 15, 'Food', 'KFC', '2020-06-06 16:18', '2020-06-06 16:18'])
                  db.run(insert, ['Pizza', 14, 'Food', 'Mcdonald', '2020-06-01 18:14', '2020-05-01 18:14'])
               }
            }
      );  
   }
});

module.exports = db

Here, we are creating a new SQLite database and loading some sample data.

Now, open server.js and place the below code (if you are not able to see the file in your application create it manually within the root directory) −

server.js

var express = require("express")
var cors = require('cors')
var db = require("./sqlitedb.js")

var app = express()
app.use(cors());

var bodyParser = require("body-parser");
app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({ extended: false }));
app.use(bodyParser.json());

var HTTP_PORT = 8000 
app.listen(HTTP_PORT, () => {
   console.log("Server running on port %PORT%".replace("%PORT%",HTTP_PORT))
});

app.get("/", (req, res, next) => {
    res.json({"message":"Ok"})
});

app.get("/api/expense", (req, res, next) => {
   var sql = "select * from expense"
   var params = []
   db.all(sql, params, (err, rows) => {
      if (err) {
        res.status(400).json({"error":err.message});
        return;
      }
      res.json(rows)
     });

});

app.get("/api/jsonp/expense", (req, res, next) => {
   var sql = "select * from expense"
   var params = []
   db.all(sql, params, (err, rows) => {
      if (err) {
         res.status(400).json({ "error": err.message });
         return;
      }
      res.jsonp(rows)
   });

});

app.get("/api/expense/:id", (req, res, next) => {
   var sql = "select * from expense where id = ?"
   var params = [req.params.id]
   db.get(sql, params, (err, row) => {
      if (err) {
         res.status(400).json({"error":err.message});
         return;
      }
      res.json(row)
   });
});

app.post("/api/expense/", (req, res, next) => {
   var errors=[]
   if (!req.body.item){
      errors.push("No item specified");
   }
   var data = {
      item : req.body.item,
      amount: req.body.amount,
      category: req.body.category,
      location : req.body.location,
      spendOn: req.body.spendOn,
      createdOn: req.body.createdOn,
   }
   var sql = 'INSERT INTO expense (item, amount, category, location, spendOn, createdOn) VALUES (?,?,?,?,?,?)'
   var params =[data.item, data.amount, data.category, data.location, data.spendOn, data.createdOn]
   db.run(sql, params, function (err, result) {
      if (err){
         res.status(400).json({"error": err.message})
         return;
      }
      data.id = this.lastID;
      res.json(data);
   });
})

app.put("/api/expense/:id", (req, res, next) => {
   var data = {
      item : req.body.item,
      amount: req.body.amount,
      category: req.body.category,
      location : req.body.location,
      spendOn: req.body.spendOn
   }
   db.run(
      `UPDATE expense SET
         item = ?, 

         amount = ?,
         category = ?, 
         location = ?, 

         spendOn = ? 
         WHERE id = ?`,
            [data.item, data.amount, data.category, data.location,data.spendOn, req.params.id],
      function (err, result) {
         if (err){
            console.log(err);
            res.status(400).json({"error": res.message})
            return;
         }
         res.json(data)
   });
})

app.delete("/api/expense/:id", (req, res, next) => {
   db.run(
      'DELETE FROM expense WHERE id = ?',
      req.params.id,
      function (err, result) {
         if (err){
            res.status(400).json({"error": res.message})
            return;
         }
         res.json({"message":"deleted", changes: this.changes})
   });
})

app.use(function(req, res){
   res.status(404);
});

Here, we create a basic CURD rest API to select, insert, update, and delete expense entries.

Output

Run the application using the below command −

npm run start

Open a browser, enter http://localhost:8000/ and press enter. You will see below response −

{ 
   "message": "Ok" 
}

The above message confirms that our application is working fine.

Change the URL tohttp://localhost:8000/api/expense, and you will see all the expense entries in JSON format.

[
   {
      "id": 1,
      "item": "Pizza",
      "amount": 10,
      "category": "Food",
      "location": "KFC",
      "spendOn": "2020-05-26 10:10",
      "createdOn": "2020-05-26 10:10"
   },
   {
      "id": 2,
      "item": "Pizza",
      "amount": 14,
      "category": "Food",
      "location": "Mcdonald",
      "spendOn": "2020-06-01 18:14",
      "createdOn": "2020-05-01 18:14"
   },
   {
      "id": 3,
      "item": "Pizza",
      "amount": 15,
      "category": "Food",
      "location": "KFC",
      "spendOn": "2020-06-06 16:18",
      "createdOn": "2020-06-06 16:18"
   },
   {
      "id": 4,
      "item": "Pizza",
      "amount": 9,
      "category": "Food",
      "location": "Mcdonald",
      "spendOn": "2020-05-28 11:10",
      "createdOn": "2020-05-28 11:10"
   },
   {
      "id": 5,
      "item": "Pizza",
      "amount": 12,
      "category": "Food",
      "location": "Mcdonald",
      "spendOn": "2020-05-29 09:22",
      "createdOn": "2020-05-29 09:22"
   }
]

Finally, we created a simple CURD REST API for expense entry, and we can access the REST API from our Angular application to learn the HttpClient module.

Here, the code will create six REST API endpoints as mentioned below:

• / endpoint returns an OK message to make sure the application is working fine.

• /api/expense endpoint returns all expense items available in the database.

• /api/jsonp/expense endpoint returns all expense items available in the database in JSONP format.

• /api/expense/:id endpoint returns the expense entry based on the expense entry id.

• /api/expense/:id endpoint with put verb will update the expense entry based on the expense entry id.

• /api/expense endpoint with post verb will add a new expense entry into the database.

• /api/expense/:id/update_amount endpoint with post verb will update the amount of the expense entry specified in the URL.

• /api/expense/:id endpoint with delete verb will delete the expense entry based on the expense entry id.