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Željko Šević
Željko Šević

Posted on • Originally published at sevic.dev on

Deploying Node.js apps to Heroku

#node #heroku #githubactions #hosting

This post covers the main notes from setting up the Heroku CLI tool to CI/CD pipeline with Github actions.

Prerequisites

  • Run the following command to install the CLI tool 
curl https://cli-assets.heroku.com/install.sh | sh
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  • Create an account or log in if you already have an account 
heroku login
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Node server

  • Run the following commands for packages setup 
npm init -y
npm i express
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  • Write basic server 
// server.js
const express = require('express');
const app = express();
const PORT = process.env.PORT || 8080;

app.get('/', (_, res) => res.send('Hello world'));

app.listen(PORT, () => {
  console.log(`Server is running on port ${PORT}`);
});
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  • Configure start script 
// package.json
{
  "scripts": {
    "start": "node server.js"
  }
}
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Project setup

The following command will create a project with the provided name. Project URL will be <PROJECT_NAME>.herokuapp.com

heroku create -a <PROJECT_NAME>
git init
heroku git:remote -a <PROJECT_NAME>
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Create a Procfile with a command for starting the server.

# Procfile
web: npm start
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Environment variables

The following commands can be used to set the provided environment variable and restart the server, show the list of already set variables, remove the provided variable and restart the server, and append the set variables to a local file (.env in this case). Heroku will set up the server port's environment variable (PORT).

heroku config:set VARIABLE_NAME=value
heroku config
heroku config:remove VARIABLE_NAME
heroku config -s >> .env
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Addons

The following commands add and remove specified add-ons.

heroku addons:create <ADDON_NAME>
heroku addons:remove <ADDON_NAME>
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Databases

Redis

Run the following commands to provision the Redis database. Heroku will set the environment variables for the database connection.

heroku addons:create upstash-redis:free
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Postgres

Run the following command to bootstrap a Postgres database.

heroku addons:create heroku-postgresql
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The previous command will set the database connection string in DATABASE_URL environment variable.

Check the database info with the following command.

heroku pg:info
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Release command in Procfile can run migrations.

# Procfile
release: npm run migrate
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The following commands create the database backups, check the progress of the last backup, and show the list of the previous backups.

heroku pg:backups:capture
heroku pg:backups:info
heroku pg:backups
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Debugging

  • Get the real-time logs 
heroku logs --tail
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  • Get the specific number of lines of logs 
heroku logs -n 20
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  • Get the info about the app 
heroku info
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  • Get the state of the project to check if there are any issues 
heroku status
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  • Run bash on the app dyno 
heroku run bash
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  • Restart the app dynos 
heroku restart
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Deployment

Manual deployment

Deploy and open the deployed version with the following commands.

git add .
git commit -m "Initial commit"
git push origin master
heroku open
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If the command for opening the project in the browser doesn't work in Windows Subsystem for Linux, set BROWSER environment in the corresponding shell configuration file (e.g., ~/.zshrc)

export BROWSER=wslview
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CI/CD pipeline

Connect the app with Github on Deploy → Deployment method page and enable CI and automatic deploys.

Add .github/workflows/config.yml file with the following configuration for the CI pipeline.

name: CI pipeline

on:
  push:
    branches:
      - master

jobs:
  build-and-deploy:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    container: node:20.9.0-alpine3.17

    steps:
      - name: Github checkout
        uses: actions/checkout@v4

      - uses: actions/setup-node@v4
        with:
          node-version: 20

      - run: npm ci

      - run: npm run lint

      - run: npm test

      - run: npm audit
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Top comments (2)

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reacthunter0324 profile image
React Hunter •

thank you

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zsevic profile image
Željko Šević •

You're welcome, and I'm glad you find this to be a helpful article.

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