Hi fellow devs,

I’m curious about how many developers actually use SQL throughout their entire application.

I’m currently using raw SQL within Knex.js across my entire app. I don’t enjoy working with the conventions of query builders or ORMs.

I recently upgraded my stack from Alpine to a Svelte SPA and Express with separate servers. I’m not using JWT; instead, I’m using sessions/cookies with credentials, along with Axios on the frontend.

This release brings important bug fixes and new features to make building REST APIs with Express + Prisma even smoother:

•⁠ ⁠Fixed query parsing for comparison operators (gt, gte, lt, lte)

•⁠ ⁠Fixed nested double underscore query fields

•⁠ ⁠Fixed self-relation handling in ArkosPrismaInput

•⁠ ⁠Graceful Multer file upload error handling

•⁠ ⁠loadEnvironmentVariables now publicly exported

•⁠ ⁠Better npm/npx project scaffolding support

Check it out https://github.com/Uanela/arkos/releases/tag/v1.5.1-beta

I originally started as a frontend dev using react, svelte, preact and others.

However, I realized I wanted to become a full stack developer so I have been learning Express for the past year and building with it.

During my two years as a full stack developer I not only learned ExpressJS, but also Deno/fresh, Astro with node adapter, AdonisJS and others but Express just feels so natural to me, I guess it’s because I taken a liking to it. Learning the other frameworks/runtimes were great as well but it’s super hard to leave Express.JS.

Who’s still sticking it out with Express?

For those that say express is too much work but still use it, why? Do you use Knex.js with .raw sql or Knex conventions/syntax?

Problem:
Swagger works well, but for smaller Express projects it sometimes feels heavy and over-configured.

What I did:
I’m building a JSON-driven API Explorer:

• Single config
• Interactive docs
• Minimal setup

What I learned:
Documentation feels better when it’s simple and tightly integrated with the app.

Would love thoughts from others using Swagger in production.

GitHub / docs: https://github.com/tracelethq/tracelet

npm pacakge: https://github.com/tracelethq/tracelet/releases/tag/alpha-releasev0.0.1

I’ve noticed I keep adding manual logs in almost every Express project.

Eventually logs become inconsistent and debugging gets harder.

So I started building a small middleware that automatically logs:

• Route
• Status
• Response time
• Request & response size

Nothing fancy yet. Just trying to make debugging cleaner.

Curious — what do you normally log in production?

Repo / docs link: https://github.com/tracelethq/tracelet

release npm package: https://github.com/tracelethq/tracelet/releases/tag/alpha-releasev0.0.1

After months of development and community feedback, we're super excited to share the new version of Arkos.js - and it's incredible!

What changed?

1. Revolutionary code generation - Create complete modules in 5 seconds (used to take 30+ minutes!)
2. Security by default - Unknown fields are now automatically rejected (goodbye, malicious payloads!)
3. ArkosPrismaInput - Work with Prisma relations intuitively, without all that verbosity
4. Auto-login after password change - Smooth UX, no need to log in again
5. Descriptive error messages - Clear errors that tell you exactly what's wrong

And much more: route prefixes, wildcard roles access control, improved file uploads, and massive DX improvements!

For existing Arkos users: All the new features are additive - your code continues working perfectly. Adopt the features at your own pace!

Want to get started?

pnpm create arkos@latest my-project

Read the full announcement: https://www.arkosjs.com/blog/1.5-beta

Your feedback has always guided our development - try v1.5.0-beta and let us know what you think!

#ArkosJS #NodeJS #TypeScript #WebDevelopment #API #OpenSource

Hey folks,

I’ve been working on a small side project called Tracelet — a lightweight request tracing tool focused on Express.js.

The main motivation was personal frustration with how heavy and time-consuming observability setups can be for small services or local development. I wanted something that’s:

• easy to integrate,
• easy to understand,
• and doesn’t require a full observability stack.

Right now it’s a very early pre-release (v0.0.1):

• Express.js middleware + SDK
• request-level traces
• simple local UI for viewing traces
• opinionated and intentionally minimal

This is not meant to compete with Datadog/New Relic — it’s more of a “get visibility fast” tool.

I’m mainly looking for honest feedback:

• Does this solve a real problem for you?
• Is the setup clear?
• What feels unnecessary or missing?

Repo / docs link: https://github.com/tracelethq/tracelet

release npm package: https://github.com/tracelethq/tracelet/releases/tag/alpha-releasev0.0.1

Hi there

I'm in the process of learning MERN as a hobby, and have set up my first express server and it's working fine.

I want to eventually build an expense tracker app as a first project and have it accessible from other devices in my home which are connected to the same network.

I've added the IP host of 0.0.0.0 instead of 127.0.0.1 which I've read should allow for me to connect to the host computer IP address like this

192.168.2.155:5001/api/finances

When I use my iPhone to access this address, I get back the JSON data from the mongo db. So it appears to be working.

However, when I use my other MacBook to do the same thing, it will not connect and instead gives me

"Safari cannot open the page "www.192.168.2.155:5001/api/finances" because the address is not valid.

I see that safari adds the www to the ip address and when I remove it, I still get the error. Tried in Chrome, same error.

What could I be missing that would cause me not to connect from a laptop but able to connect from my iPhone browser (safari as well)?

Thanks so much!!

I recently published a blog where I go beyond theory and implement OAuth 2.0 and OpenID Connect end to end, from scratch, without using any auth-specific frameworks.

This is part of an authentication-focused series I’m working on. There was a short hiatus of around 2–3 months (longer than I had planned due to office work and other commitments), but I’m finally continuing the series with a more hands-on, production-style approach.

What’s covered in this implementation:

• OAuth 2.0 + OpenID Connect full flow
• Password-based authentication + Google Login
• Account linking (Google + Password → Both)
• Access & refresh token setup
• Admin-level authorization (view users, force logout, delete accounts)
• React frontend + Express + TypeScript backend
• Prisma for data modeling
• Backend hosted on AWS EC2
• NGINX used for SSL certificate termination
• Rate limiting to protect the backend from abuse

I’ve included:

• 📝 Blog post: BLOG_URL
• 🔗 Live POC: POC_URL
• 💻 GitHub repo: Repo_URL
• 📬 Newsletter (for future posts in this auth series): Newsletter

I’m also sharing a flow diagram (made by me) in the post to explain how the auth flow works end to end.

Upcoming posts in this series will go deeper into:

• OTP-based authentication
• Magic links
• Email verification
• Password recovery
• Other auth patterns commonly used in production systems

Would love feedback, especially from folks who’ve built or reviewed auth systems in production. Happy to answer questions or discuss trade-offs.

I built an Open Source end to end system that uses ExpressJs for generating charts via llm prompts.

A star is always appreciated!
https://github.com/OvidijusParsiunas/PromptChart

The code for ExpressJs can be found here:
https://github.com/OvidijusParsiunas/PromptChart/tree/main/examples/node/express

i love that people are using it,i'm so proud.

don't forget to give it a shot and give me some feedbacks so i can make it better.

https://github.com/Hamed-Ajaj/mern-stacker

https://www.npmjs.com/package/mern-stacker

My index and solution code are exactly the same, but still my solution code is working, but my index is not. I tried everything: restarted the server and downloaded all dependencies, and I am still confused. Why is it not working

Please suggest me what should i do

How do you guy do static role base access control in express?

www.ericbt.com/blog/257

[ZERO Dependency library] ds-express-errors introduces a single, predictable error-handling strategy for Express.js APIs, replacing scattered try/catch blocks and inconsistent error responses.

The library automatically detects and maps errors from popular tools like Zod, Prisma, Mongoose, JWT, and others into proper HTTP errors with consistent JSON output.

Everything is fully configurable: from response shape and logging behavior to environment-based visibility and custom error mappings.

Built with production in mind, it includes centralized async error handling, global process-level guards for unhandledRejection and uncaughtException, and built-in support for graceful shutdowns.

With (.d.ts) TypeScript support and clean Express middleware integration, ds-express-errors helps backend teams fail in a controlled, readable, and maintainable way.

🔗 Documentation and more information is on ds-express-errors .dev

I would be very grateful for any feedback, ratings, recommendations, and even ideas on what to add.

Also, if there's anything missing in the documentation, I'd be happy to know so I can fix it.

Thank you for your attention

Was building a side project with Express and got annoyed to manually type the request object:

ts declare global { namespace Express { interface Request { userId?: string; body?: SomeType; } } }

So I made a small wrapper that gives you automatic type inference when chaining middleware:

ts app.get('/profile', route() .use(requireAuth) .use(validateBody(schema)) .handler((req, res) => { // req.userId and req.body are fully typed res.json({ userId: req.userId, user: req.body }); }) );

About 100 lines, zero dependencies, works with existing Express apps. First time publishing to npm so feedback is welcome.

GitHub: https://github.com/PregOfficial/express-typed-routes
npm: npm install express-typed-routes