Integration Architectures MEAN-Template

This template is meant to support students getting started with the Integration Architectures project.

Prerequisites

1. You need a Node.js runtime. It is available at: https://nodejs.org/en/download .

   Please download version 24.x.x (in summer of 2025 this is the latest stable version).

   !!! Important: On Windows (and maybe also other operating systems) it is necessary to reboot the device after this step, to refresh the PATH and make node commands available in shell.

2. Access to a MongoDB server is necessary. If you don't have one already, you should download the community server at: https://www.mongodb.com/try/download/community . Upon installation, I would recommend you to select, that MongoDB Compass should also be installed. It's a nice GUI-application for managing MongoDB Servers and Databases.

Setup

You can use your favourite IDE to work on your applications. But please note, that our examples mostly cover the IDEs from Jetbrains (IntelliJ, WebStorm etc.).

1. Cloning this git repository

   You need to clone your team's repository, using the URL, handed out by faculty staff. It can simply be done through your IDE or using git bash.

   In the IDEs from Jetbrains git repositories can be cloned by selecting ☰ > File > New > Project from Version Control (Shown on the left of the screenshot). There is also a "Clone Repository" button on the welcome-screen, when no project is currently open. Either way a dialog is displayed (like shown below), where you can paste the URL and clone it.
   
   Alternatively git bash can be used. Simply type/paste this at the desired location:

   git clone https://github.com/aldaGit/iar-framework

   (replace the URL by the one, you have been given)

2. Installing dependencies

   The dependencies of this software can be installed with node package manager (npm). Both front- and backend need to be handled separately.
   

   In IntelliJ and Webstorm you can just right-click the package.json file and select "Run 'npm install'" to install the dependencies.
   Alternatively you navigate to the location of the package.json inside your shell and then run npm install.
   
   Either way, this has to be done both in the directory frontend/ and backend/.

Launching the Applications

For both front- and backend there are run scripts included in their package.json. So you can just start them by running the command npm run start in their respective directories. On Windows systems you should start the backend with npm run start_win, because there environment variables are handled a little different than in Unix.

After both applications are done starting, the frontend can be reached from your browser at: http://localhost:4200/ You can log in with username admin and the password, which is preconfigured at either backend/environment/environment.js for local use or backend/environment/environment.prod.js for remote deployment. In case you changed and forgot your password, you may empty the collection 'user' in the database and restart the backend. Then a new admin user will be created upon restart/redeployment.

Result

If your Login was successful, you will see this page:

Run Configurations

In IntelliJ or WebStorm, it is possible to store the startup commands in a convenient way and start your applications at a push of a button. To do so, click on the dropdown-menu at the top right of the window and select "Edit Configurations..." at the upper right of your IntelliJ Window. A window will open, which looks like this:

In that window, you click the plus in the upper left corner and then select "npm" from the dropdown menu. This creates a new run configuration. On the right of the window, you can give your run configuration a name, like "frontend". Also, you have to select the package.json. In this example, the one of the frontend. Make sure "run" is selected as the command and "start" is selected as the script. After that, you can save your run configuration and try it out. These steps have to be repeated for the backend. In this case, obviously selecting the package.json of the backend.