How to host a Node.Js application in shared hosting [closed]

Asked 16/7, 2014 at 9:55 Answered 22/11, 2015 at 16:49

124

How to host a Node.Js application in a shared hosting

I want to host a node.js application in shared hosting. Does anyone have any reference or documentation to refer to?

Cassandracassandre answered 16/7, 2014 at 9:55 Comment(4)

The way i figured it by running npm build will generate js files which you can minify and then include then in your script tags. Example when building with vuejs or even angular2 cli – Grab 21/5, 2017 at 12:49

this worked - shame I can't post an answer... a2hosting.com/kb/installable-applications/manual-installations/… – Troublous 7/3, 2018 at 2:10

@Dan-Cornilescu can the be re-opened. It is valuable. It would be better in superuser. Also found an answer that I would like to add. – Troublous 7/3, 2018 at 2:18

On most shared hosts installing Node and NPM will fail (CentOS Not Supported); here is a solution (using Node v6.2.2) - medium.com/@yatko/… – Frigidarium 26/9, 2018 at 17:7

179

You can run node.js server on a typical shared hosting with Linux, Apache and PHP (LAMP). I have successfully installed it, even with NPM, Express and Grunt working fine. Follow the steps:

1) Create a new PHP file on the server with the following code and run it:

<?php
//Download and extract the latest node
exec('curl http://nodejs.org/dist/latest/node-v0.10.33-linux-x86.tar.gz | tar xz');
//Rename the folder for simplicity
exec('mv node-v0.10.33-linux-x86 node');

2) The same way install your node app, e.g. jt-js-sample, using npm:

<?php
exec('node/bin/npm install jt-js-sample');

3) Run the node app from PHP:

<?php
//Choose JS file to run
$file = 'node_modules/jt-js-sample/index.js';
//Spawn node server in the background and return its pid
$pid = exec('PORT=49999 node/bin/node ' . $file . ' >/dev/null 2>&1 & echo $!');
//Wait for node to start up
usleep(500000);
//Connect to node server using cURL
$curl = curl_init('http://127.0.0.1:49999/');
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_HEADER, 1);
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
//Get the full response
$resp = curl_exec($curl);
if($resp === false) {
    //If couldn't connect, try increasing usleep
    echo 'Error: ' . curl_error($curl);
} else {
    //Split response headers and body
    list($head, $body) = explode("\r\n\r\n", $resp, 2);
    $headarr = explode("\n", $head);
    //Print headers
    foreach($headarr as $headval) {
        header($headval);
    }
    //Print body
    echo $body;
}
//Close connection
curl_close($curl);
//Close node server
exec('kill ' . $pid);

Voila! Have a look at the demo of a node app on PHP shared hosting.

EDIT: I started a Node.php project on GitHub.

Symphony answered 10/12, 2014 at 1:4 Comment(21)

and installing mongoDB too? – Virge 6/1, 2015 at 2:43

@Virge It should be possible since mongodb doesn't need root. Just follow the manual install guide. – Symphony 6/1, 2015 at 11:41

@Symphony What about in Windows with XAMPP? – Amenable 26/3, 2015 at 9:46

What if Host provider know's this trick and removes our node instance an other files? – Fuhrman 4/4, 2015 at 17:1

@user2118784: Windows doesn't have wget, kill, tar, etc. I may work with cygwin, but it's not supported. @Nirus: It depends on hosting Terms of Service, but usually your files belong to you and they cannot delete them. – Symphony 28/4, 2015 at 10:11

Really Good One, But how to install Phantomjs using node.php – Billie 4/9, 2015 at 7:13

Be advised you shall update the download URL accordingly – Klemm 19/11, 2015 at 19:47

node.php is very good! – Juvenility 21/11, 2015 at 6:2

@niutech, the page says to switch to admin mode, how do i do this? – Heymann 15/5, 2016 at 16:31

@smerny By setting ADMIN_MODE to true on line 13 of node.php – Symphony 15/5, 2016 at 23:17

Error requesting node_modules/bower/: Failed to connect to 127.0.0.1 port 49999: Connection refused – Kokoschka 13/6, 2016 at 12:45

@MiomirDancevic It means the node process didn't start. Try going through troubleshooting. – Symphony 14/6, 2016 at 13:55

So I can use socket.io too? wow nice triks. haha – Remotion 26/10, 2016 at 4:46

Cool trick, though keep in mind a lot of shared hosting providers will kill this process and consider it misuse of a shared hosting account... – Ichor 6/2, 2017 at 17:16

Fatal error: Call to undefined function curl_init() Aww. Do I have any chances? – Posse 11/11, 2017 at 11:29

@kim366 See github.com/niutech/node.php/issues/32 – Symphony 13/11, 2017 at 11:45

won't shared services have restrictions against curl? – Axon 19/3, 2018 at 23:50

@NevilleNazerane node.php uses PHP cURL, whch is enabled by most sharing hosts. – Symphony 20/3, 2018 at 11:51

@knnhcn yes, I can confirm it works – Digestion 21/6, 2019 at 19:54

usleep(500000); half second of wait on each request? – Venom 23/12, 2019 at 11:46

God this error when running http://example.org/node.php?npm=install jt-js-sample : Running: node/bin/npm --cache ./.npm -- install jt-js-sample Failed. Error: 127. See npm-debug.log – Illume 7/1 at 2:21

Connect with SSH and follow these instructions to install Node on a shared hosting

In short you first install NVM, then you install the Node version of your choice with NVM.

wget -qO- https://cdn.rawgit.com/creationix/nvm/master/install.sh | bash

Your restart your shell (close and reopen your sessions). Then you

nvm install stable

to install the latest stable version for example. You can install any version of your choice. Check node --version for the node version you are currently using and nvm list to see what you've installed.

In bonus you can switch version very easily (nvm use <version>)

There's no need of PHP or whichever tricky workaround if you have SSH.

Cadet answered 22/11, 2015 at 16:49 Comment(12)

Hi, thanks for the answer. Although, I am running into trouble, it says that node is not found, once I do the install using nvm. Any help? – Lorri 4/1, 2017 at 13:12

Maybe should you try https://mcmap.net/q/182147/-npm-not-found-when-using-nvm if you have that node not found error with nvm – Cadet 20/1, 2017 at 23:35

Most shared hosting providers don't give SSH access. At least not mine. – Retraction 21/2, 2017 at 5:6

This worked on a shared host on hostgator – Scuttlebutt 11/3, 2017 at 22:6

Worked perfectly!! Thanks – Paske 19/3, 2017 at 13:28

hi...after i follow the first step...and then i try to run "nvm install stable"...but it said "nvm: command not found" ...what is the problem? – Marvelous 6/4, 2017 at 7:54

Nodejs and Npm install complete. How to run app on domain? – Jarmon 3/5, 2017 at 11:43

@SyamsoulAzrien if you got nvm:command not found you can run this: command source ~/.nvm/nvm.sh – Karoline 4/12, 2017 at 19:49

This config change to public_html/.htaccess worked: a2hosting.com/kb/installable-applications/manual-installations/… – Troublous 7/3, 2018 at 2:20

the wget command failed to work for me on shared GoDaddy hosting, I had to download the install.sh file to my local system and manually upload to the server and then run bash install,sh @SyamsoulAzrien maybe try this – Varia 27/7, 2020 at 15:29

if the give command with wget doesn't work for you, try using curl >> curl -o- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvm-sh/nvm/v0.35.3/install.sh | bash – Malleolus 16/8, 2020 at 14:21

LOLLL thanks millions of times ! – Hyperactive 24/3, 2021 at 6:1

I installed Node.js on bluehost.com (a shared server) using:

wget <path to download file>
tar -xf <gzip file>
mv <gzip_file_dir> node

This will download the tar file, extract to a directory and then rename that directory to the name 'node' to make it easier to use.

then

./node/bin/npm install jt-js-sample

Returns:
npm WARN engine [email protected]: wanted: {"node":"0.10.x"} (current: {"node":"0.12.4","npm":"2.10.1"})
[email protected] node_modules/jt-js-sample
└── [email protected] ([email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected])

I can now use the commands:

# ~/node/bin/node -v
v0.12.4

# ~/node/bin/npm -v
2.10.1

For security reasons, I have renamed my node directory to something else.

Spirituous answered 31/5, 2015 at 18:11 Comment(3)

I tried npm start in the jt-js-sample and I went to mysite.com:5000 but it said page not available. Do I need to go to the IP address instead? – Ploy 5/6, 2015 at 17:54

that port is probably blocked, you should use the standard 80 port – Dysfunction 13/11, 2017 at 17:48

~/node/bin/npm -v gives me an error saying: let notifier = require('update-notifier')({pkg}) SyntaxError: Unexpected identifier at exports.runInThisContext (vm.js:69:16) at Module._compile (module.js:432:25) at Object.Module._extensions..js (module.js:467:10) at Module.load (module.js:349:32) at Function.Module._load (module.js:305:12) at Function.Module.runMain (module.js:490:10) at startup (node.js:123:16) at node.js:1027:3 – Ivetteivetts 8/6, 2018 at 5:37

A2 Hosting permits node.js on their shared hosting accounts. I can vouch that I've had a positive experience with them.

Here are instructions in their KnowledgeBase for installing node.js using Apache/LiteSpeed as a reverse proxy: https://www.a2hosting.com/kb/installable-applications/manual-installations/installing-node-js-on-managed-hosting-accounts . It takes about 30 minutes to set up the configuration, and it'll work with npm, Express, MySQL, etc.

See a2hosting.com.

Duchamp answered 12/9, 2015 at 5:49 Comment(4)

Thank you! Just what I was looking for. – Lashay 27/4, 2017 at 0:20

Almost two years later, A2 Hosting is still one of the very few hosting providers officially supporting Node.js on their shared servers. A recent getting started guide can be found here – Euphrates 16/1, 2018 at 19:21

does react and front end run well on shared node js hosting plan ? any idea – Flathead 4/5, 2018 at 13:33

Wrote a blog on the same. medium.com/@pampas93/… – Detachment 27/5, 2020 at 19:49

You should look for a hosting company that provides such feature, but standard simple static+PHP+MySQL hosting won't let you use node.js.

You need either find a hosting designed for node.js or buy a Virtual Private Server and install it yourself.

Skim answered 16/7, 2014 at 10:0 Comment(4)

do you mean it is not possible to host Node.js application using shared hosting – Cassandracassandre 16/7, 2014 at 10:4

@Cassandracassandre It is possible - see my answer. – Symphony 10/12, 2014 at 1:4

It's a cool trick, though keep in mind a lot of shared hosting providers will kill this process and consider it misuse of a shared hosting account... – Ichor 6/2, 2017 at 17:16

technically possible as @Symphony said, but I definitely wouldn't consider it production safe, other colleague (cannot mention more than one user) is right, I believe most hosting providers will kill the node process or you would run out of processor cycle time very soon – Skim 6/2, 2017 at 23:15

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