Mern Docker prod

This is dockerized Mern repo template (Create React App, Express, MongoDB, Nginx, pm2, Traefik) meant for production environments and client side rendering where static assets are served by Nginx. It uses strategy with two separate images for client and server. Both client and server containers are then routed to subdomain and exposed through Traefik reverse proxy.

How to use this

• copy files from the root folder to yours project root folder
• copy docker folders inside yours client and server folders
• forward your specific environment variables in docker-compose.yml; Note: use either environment: key with .env file from the root folder or env_file: key with separate .env files from client and server folders
• client container handles all routes except server routes /api, /auth, /public/images which are handled by server container. This is needed i.e. for Facebook and Google OAuth that need to access server routes directly. Same /api, /auth, /public/images routes are ignored by Nginx in client/docker/default.conf. You can customize this to your own needs.
• Important: you want to build images locally and push them to Docker Hub and pull images on server in docker-compose.yml instead of building images directly on server. This is needed because to build images you need 4GB+ RAM while 0.5GB is usually enough to run your app.
• run with docker-compose up -d

Related projects and example deployment

• https://github.com/nemanjam/traefik-proxy - here you can find complete Traefik deployment with Mern example on this path traefik-proxy/apps/mern-boilerplate
• this template is used to dockerize this example Mern app mern-boilerplate

Deployments tips

Copy local .env file to server

# run from traefik-proxy folder
scp ./apps/mern-boilerplate/.env ubuntu@amd1:~/traefik-proxy/apps/mern-boilerplate

Troubleshooting MongoDB connection running in a container

Error 1: MongoError: Authentication failed

• Solution: append ?authSource=admin to connection string
• Important: must delete files in server/docker/mongo-data volume

sudo rm -rf ./server/docker/mongo-data/* # doesn't delete files with .
sudo rm -rf ./server/docker/mongo-data/.mongodb

• example of a working MongoDB url:

MONGO_URI_PROD=mongodb://username:$password@mongo-service:27017/db-name?authSource=admin

Error 2: MongooseServerSelectionError: getaddrinfo EAI_AGAIN mdp-mongo

• Solution 1: add default network in docker-compose.yml mongo and server services

networks:
  - default

• Solution 2: append &directConnection=true to connection string

References

• tutorial and repository KaranJagtiani/MERN-Docker-Production-Boilerplate by Karan Jagtiani
• tutorial Dockerizing a React App by Michael Herman