How to run Node.js application

This article contains steps how to run Node.js application on MonsterASP.NET hosting.

ASP.NET / .NET freehosting
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1. Initial Setup
   Create a website from our hosting Control panel.

2. Create simple script
   Create a simple Node.js Hello world! sample script.

hello.js

var http = require('http');

http.createServer(function (req, res) {
    res.writeHead(200, {'Content-Type': 'text/html'});
    res.end('Hello, world! [helloworld sample; iisnode version is ' + process.env.IISNODE_VERSION + ', node version is ' + process.version + ']');
}).listen(process.env.PORT);  

Save sample script as hello.js file.

3. Upload script hello.js file
   Upload script file to /wwwroot directory on hosting Website. You can use FTP/SFTP access to upload script file.
   How to publish files via FileZilla Client
   
   
4. Upload configuration web.config file
   To run Node.js application, you must also upload web.config file to /wwwroot directory which contains necessary configuration for Node.js.

Folder \wwwroot is website root and hello.js and web.config files must be located in this directory.

Necessary configuration file
web.config

<configuration>
    <system.webServer>
  
     <handlers>
       <add name="iisnode" path="hello.js" verb="*" modules="iisnode" />
     </handlers>

    <defaultDocument>
      <files>
        <add value="hello.js" />
      </files>
    </defaultDocument>

     <rewrite>
       <rules>
         <rule name="nodejs">
           <match url="(.*)" />
           <conditions>
             <add input="{REQUEST_FILENAME}" matchType="IsFile" negate="true" />
           </conditions>
           <action type="Rewrite" url="/hello.js" />
         </rule>
       </rules>
     </rewrite>
  
     </system.webServer> 
 </configuration>

Website result in browser:

You do not need to run any command line like npm or node to host Node.js application on MonsterASP.NET.
Node modules must be uploaded to node_modules directory. You must install all required node modules locally using npm before upload application on Website.