I recently started a new project using NodeJS. The code uses several NodeJS applications with TypeScript. I wanted to document the steps to set up a new NodeJS application for future reference.

NodeJS

First, initial a folder as a NodeJS application:

mkdir myapp
cd myapp
npm init -y

TypeScript

Now install the typescript dependencies:

npm install typescript ts-node @types/node --save-dev
npx tsc --init

Add this to the scripts section in the package.json file:

"start": "ts-node ./src/app.ts",

Now you can use npm start to build and run the application locally.

Create the entry point for your application. Add a folder called src and add an app.ts file:

console.log("Hello, World!");

To configure how the TypeScript output is generated, modify the tsconfig.json file.

For example, if the output JS files need to be in separate folder, set the outDir property:

"outDir": "./build",

What’s Next

This setup is a generic one, regardless of the type of application you are creating. If you are creating a command-line application, a REST API or a cloud function, you can use this base setup for all application types.

You can also use formatting (prettier), linting (ES Lint) and unit testing (Mocha/Chai) with TypeScript which I will explore in other posts.