Top Node.js best practices you should know- Full guide 2022

The Node js runtime is based on Chrome’s V8 JavaScript engine. Node js is a lightweight and scalable network-driven app framework built on an asynchronous event-driven JavaScript runtime. The development of Node js applications can be readily scaled in both horizontal and vertical orientations. Both client-side and server-side apps are built with Node js. It has an open-source JavaScript runtime environment/model that allows single modules to be cached. As a result, Node js popularity of JS is predicted to skyrocket in 2022.

Introduction

We’ll go over some of the most significant best practices for programming performance with node js in this blog, with relevant code examples. With these best practices in place, the app may automatically reduce JavaScript runtime problems and transform into a high-performance, robust node.js application, and process. Because Node js is based on JavaScript, the normal JavaScript best practices apply in addition to the coding principles discussed in this article.

Steps

1. Break down your solution into components.

Maintaining a large code base with several dependencies is one of the most difficult tasks for larger apps. While adding new features, it slows down production and development. We should partition the entire program into smaller components, giving each module its own folder and ensuring that each module is maintained basic and tiny, according to Node.js best practices.

2. Component Layering

Because layering is crucial, each component is created with ‘layers.’ These layers have a distinct object that can be used on the web, logic, and data access code, as per Node.js best practices. This allows for a clear separation of performance issues and a considerable distinction between processes and mock and test codes.

3. For a new project, use npm

Npm init will generate a package for you.

The information for your project can be found in a JSON file for your project that lists all of the packages/node apps installed by npm install.

4. Make an npm package out of Common Utilities

The same code is usually reused several times at different locations in larger app/project processes. We can put them all together into a single private package file and use it throughout our app. Npm install reduces code duplication and makes it easier to handle.

5. Keep the ‘app’ and server parts of Express separate

Many developers make the most typical mistake in each project: they define the full express application process in large files. Instead, we should break the ‘Express’ definition into at least two separate files. One is for the API declaration (app.js) and the other is for network issues. Our API declarations can also be found in numerous components.

6. Using a Configuration File that is Environment Aware, Secured, and Hierarchical

We should maintain our app-level keys easily readable via file and environment variables as a security best practice. We should also store secrets outside of the code and create a config file hierarchy to make things easier to find. A perfect and flawless configuration setup is required to meet all of these requirements. There are a few node.js development project structures that can assist with this, such as rc, nconf, and config.

7. In-App Garbage Avoidance

Despite the fact that Node js uses a greedy and lazy garbage collector, it has a default limit of 1.5 GB for a single CPU core as a process manager. It waits until the memory limit is reached before automatically recovering.

We can set the flags on V8 to provide you with additional control over the garbage collector.

8. Tie everything together

We can use Npm’s lifecycle scripts to create fantastic hooks for automation. We can use preinstall script to run things before we construct our app. You can use a post-install script in a JSON package to develop assets for a production application using grunt, gulp, browserify, or webpack.

9. Using Promises or Async-Await

To handle async errors, good development standards recommend using javascript asynchronous function’ for numerous callbacks inside promises. However, this procedure leads to a callback hell problem. To overcome this speed issue, we can look at the existing libraries or use async and await in javascript. The promises function will be used by the process manager to catch code errors. It simplifies the code and makes it more readable.

10. Centralized Error Handling

Every error-handling functionality, such as recording performance and sending error-related emails, should be implemented so that all APIs, night tasks, and unit testing can debug messages and call this method if an issue occurs.

11. Validating the Request Body 

Developers can use open-source programs like Joi to check that the request body is correct and free of harmful information. Before performing the actual logic, we can validate all of the request parameters and body parameters to ensure that they conform to the required schema. Before performing actual logic, we can raise an error to the user input indicating the requested body is invalid.

12. Using Error Handling Mechanisms Built-In

Developers have a variety of alternative options for raising and resolving errors. They have the option of using strings or even creating new types. Within our source code and other open-source JSON packages, the built-in error object provides a consistent approach to handling problems.

13. To avoid a partial stacktrace, always wait for promises before returning.

It’s critical to have a full stacktrace of the error flow when an error occurs, whether from a synchronous or asynchronous flow. Surprisingly, if an async method returns a promise without awaiting (e.g., calls another async function), an error should occur, causing the caller function to vanish from the stacktrace.

This will leave the person with only limited information to diagnose the problem — Furthermore, if the fault is caused by that caller function, there is a feature called “zero-cost async stacktraces” in version 8 that prevents stacktraces from being chopped on the most recent await.

14. Make Use Of Linting Packets

There are several linting tools available; ESLint is one of the most prominent, and it is used to check for any problems in code. You can also use it to verify code styles to ensure that they comply with best practices standards. It detects anything from spacing flaws to dangerous code patterns that could lead to security threats or app-breaking in the future.

15. Give Your Functions a Name

You can give names to all of the functions, including closures and callbacks. Anonymous functions can be limited in their use. Use the Naming function if possible. Naming allows you to quickly implement what you want and then go on to the next step. Take a picture of your memory use.

16. Constants, variables, functions, and classes should all be named properly

All constants, functions, variables, and class names should be declared in lowercase as a conventional best practice. Also, instead of utilizing short forms, we should utilize full forms that are clearly understood by everyone who uses them. Between two worlds, we should use underscore.

17. When in doubt, choose Const over Let. Var

Const variables cannot be altered; this will assist you to avoid using the same variable many times, allowing us to keep our code tidy. We’ll use the let keyword in some cases where we need to re-assign variables. If we wish to re-declare a variable value in a loop, we can use let.

Aside from that, “let variables” have blocked the scope, which means they can only be accessed within the block where they are declared. Variables declared with the var keyword can be used anywhere within a function.

18. Add all the most important modules to avoid inside functions.

Required modules should be placed near the beginning of the function rather than in the middle. This allows us to readily identify the file’s dependencies and avoid certain potential performance difficulties.

19. Instead of adding entire files, add required modules in folders.

The index.js files, which export the module’s members so that they may be imported into other files, can be placed here. It acts as a user interface for our module, allowing us to make changes in the future without violating the contract.

20. The use of the Strict Equality Operator (===) 

Instead of using the weaker abstract equality operator = ==, use the strict equality operator ===. == converts two variables to a common type before comparing them, whereas === does not type case variables and assures that both variables are of the same type and equal.

21. Instead of using callbacks, use async.

Await Async-await is supported in all versions of Node.js above Node 8 LTS. To better deal with asynchronous programming, we can reduce the use of ‘callbacks’ and ‘promises.’ It gives the appearance of synchronous code, but it’s actually a non-blocking method. The best thing we can do with async-await is to make code compact and use try-catch syntax.

22. Using Arrow Functions (=>) 

The Arrow functions make the code more concise and retain the root function’s lexical context (i.e. this). When working with ancient APIs that can make promises or callbacks, it is recommended to utilize async-await apps to avoid using functional parameters.

Conclusion

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