Grand Comics Database - Node.js REST API

I created this project to replace the Comic Vine API in a mobile app I was developing called Longboxit. The core of the server is using Node.js, Express.js, and Bookshelf.js.

I wrote a series of blog posts explaining how I initially set everything up and started building out endpoints. You can check it out at harrybaldwin.com.

Project Overview

The project uses 2 databases. The main MySQL database holds the Grand Comics Database and MongoDB holds the OAuth information. I did not want to try to add new tablse and data into the MySQL since I was going to have to update the data every month or so.

All requests require OAuth 2 client credentials grant type. The Making Requests section will have more information on using OAuth.

Getting started

You will of course need Node.js installed. For initial development I used Node v4.4.4.

Note: The Gulp file will probably not work on Windows machines.

1. git clone repo
2. npm install
3. Install MongoDB locally
4. Next you will need to seed MongoDB with OAuth client data. Open mongo shell and run use comicsapi-dev and then run db.clients.insertOne({clientId:'somerandomclientid', clientSecret: 'somerandomclientsecret', name: 'client name'});.
5. Install MySQL locally
6. Download the latest Grand Comics DB dump and import into local MySQL.
7. npm install gulp -g
8. gulp
9. ctrl+c to stop server. To make sure all processes are stopped you can run gulp stop also.

Making Requests

1. Base64 encode clientid:clientsecret
2. Use the base64 value in a POST request to /oauth/token
3. curl -X POST -H "Authorization: Basic generatedbase64value" -H "Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded" -d 'grant_type=client_credentials' "http://localhost:8080/oauth/token"
4. This request will return an access_token which you will now be able to use for any request to /api/*
5. curl -X GET -H "Authorization: Bearer access_token" "http://localhost:8080/api/series/1571/"

Endpoints

Series

GET /series

Parameters	Required	Description
name	No	Search by Series name
limit	No	Limits results. Defaults to 10
page	No	Page number that should be returned. Defaults to 1

GET /series/:id

GET /series:id/details

GET /series:id/brands

GET /series:id/indicia_publishers

Issues

GET /issues

Parameters	Required	Description
series_id	No	Get Issues by series_id
barcode	No	Get Issues by barcode
limit	No	Limits results. Defaults to 10
page	No	Page number that should be returned. Defaults to 1

GET /issues:id

Running Tests

gulp test