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Step 10 - Save your blog posts

Working with the last few files

We've included a front end JavaScript file in the public folder called script.js. We need to include this in the index.html so paste this line just before the </body> tag:

  <script src="./script.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

You'll note that in the src folder there's a file called posts.json.

JSON is a type of file for structuring data in a readable way. It is also a really popular format for sending data across the web.

JSON is a string representation of a JavaScript object. JSON objects convert really easily to Javascript objects, and vice versa, with JSON.parse() and JSON.stringify().

(If you're not sure about JavaScript objects, have a chat with your mentor and your team.)

If you look at posts.json will see there's already one blog post there. The format is:

{
    [timestamp]: [blog post message]
}

We've used a timestamp as the key so that the blog posts are listed in chronological order. Also, it's a record of when the blog post was created.

Your job is now to:

  1. Save your blog post data into posts.json

  2. Handle the script.js request coming into the server

  3. Retrieve all your posts and send them back to script.js

You can do these tasks in any order, but it might be easier to:

  1. first focus on loading the existing blog post in posts.json
  2. work out how to add new blog posts to posts.json

Loading existing blog posts

script.js is trying to load existing posts by making a GET request. Look inside script.js and see if you can find any useful endpoints. fs.readFile() might be useful here.

The code in script.js is expecting to receive a JSON object. Remember your http headers!

Saving data to a file

At the moment, your blog posts are reaching the server, but aren't being saved anywhere. They just disappear into a cloud of bits and bytes. We need to find a way to save them so that you can retrieve them later.

To add your own blog posts to posts.json, you will need to read the file from the hard drive, add to it, then write it back.

You'll remember that fs.readFile() is the method responsible for reading files from your hard drive. Well, fs.writeFile() is a method that allows you to write data into a file.

fs.writeFile('path/to/file', yourData, (error) {

    // do something after the file has been written
});

Things to remember

  • You'll want to make sure your blog posts are also added with a timestamp. You can get the current unix timestamp using Date.now().

  • fs.writeFile() automatically overwrites the whole file. Chances are you don't want to lose all your old blog posts, so think about how you can combine fs.readFile() and fs.writeFile() to prevent overwriting.

  • You will need to convert between JSON and a javascript object several times. JSON.parse() and JSON.stringify() are what you need.

If all goes well, you should have a fully functional CMS!

Lastly, you can commit your final changes and push to github:

git add .
git commit -m 'enter relevant message'
git push origin master

🎉CONGRATULATIONS!!🎉

Want more? Then head over to...

**Stretch goals >>> **

Keywords