Getting node.js to read files in html format

Question

I am developing a small app in Node.js. I am just using Node.js for input and output. The actual website is just running through nginx. The website has a Websocket connection with node.js and is primarily used for db manipulations.

One of the things I am trying to do is get node to send small pieces of html along with the data from the database. I tried the following code.

simplified:

    connection.on('message', function(message) {
        fs.readFile(__dirname + '/views/user.html', function(err, html){

            if(err){
                console.log(err);
            }else{
                connection.sendUTF( JSON.stringify({
                    content: html,
                    data: {}
                }));
            }
        });
    }
});

When I console.log(html) on the server or in the client I only get numbers back.

Anyone know what could be wrong.

NOTE: I really want to stay away from stuff like socket.io, express, etc. Just keeping it as simple as possible and no fallbacks are needed.

Step 3 of this? Also, apparently you might want to replace "sendHeader" with "writeHead". — zelk
– zelk, Commented Mar 17, 2012 at 10:16

Sebastian Stumpf · Accepted Answer · 2012-03-17 10:20:55Z

48

If you don't specify an encoding for fs.readFile, you will retrieve the raw buffer instead of the expected file contents.

Try calling it this way:

fs.readFile(__dirname + '/views/user.html', 'utf8', function(err, html){
....

answered Mar 17, 2012 at 10:20

Sebastian Stumpf

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1 Comment

Saif Bechan Over a year ago

Ok, I will try that. I thought I read in documentation that it automatically defaults to utf8 when you do not specify any. Maybe I overlooked something. Will try this and report back.

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