Publish production Node.js API starter

Author: ManiMKM1994

.env.example

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+NODE_ENV=development
+PORT=3000
+LOG_LEVEL=info
+TRUST_PROXY=false
+SHUTDOWN_TIMEOUT_MS=10000

.github/workflows/ci.yml

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+name: CI
+on:
+  push:
+    branches: [main]
+  pull_request:
+permissions:
+  contents: read
+jobs:
+  test:
+    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+    timeout-minutes: 10
+    steps:
+      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
+      - uses: actions/setup-node@v4
+        with:
+          node-version: 22
+          cache: npm
+      - run: npm ci
+      - run: npm run lint
+      - run: npm test

.gitignore

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+node_modules/
+.env
+coverage/
+*.log
+.DS_Store

Dockerfile

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+FROM node:22-alpine AS dependencies
+WORKDIR /app
+COPY package*.json ./
+RUN npm ci --omit=dev
+
+FROM node:22-alpine
+ENV NODE_ENV=production
+WORKDIR /app
+USER node
+COPY --chown=node:node --from=dependencies /app/node_modules ./node_modules
+COPY --chown=node:node package.json ./
+COPY --chown=node:node src ./src
+EXPOSE 3000
+HEALTHCHECK --interval=30s --timeout=3s --retries=3 CMD wget -qO- http://127.0.0.1:3000/health/live || exit 1
+CMD ["node", "src/server.js"]

LICENSE

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+MIT License
+
+Copyright (c) 2026 Manikandan Menon
+
+Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
+
+The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
+
+THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

README.md

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+# Production Node.js API Starter
+
+[![CI](https://github.com/ManikandaMkM/node-production-api-starter/actions/workflows/ci.yml/badge.svg)](https://github.com/ManikandaMkM/node-production-api-starter/actions/workflows/ci.yml)
+[![Node.js](https://img.shields.io/badge/Node.js-22-339933?logo=nodedotjs&logoColor=white)](https://nodejs.org/)
+[![License](https://img.shields.io/badge/license-MIT-0B6E63)](LICENSE)
+
+A deliberately small Express 5 starter demonstrating production concerns often missing from hello-world APIs: validated configuration, structured logging, request IDs, secure defaults, consistent errors, health probes, graceful shutdown, tests, CI, and a non-root container.
+
+## Quick start
+
+```bash
+cp .env.example .env
+npm install
+npm run dev
+```
+
+```bash
+curl http://localhost:3000/health/ready
+curl -X POST http://localhost:3000/api/v1/echo \
+  -H 'content-type: application/json' \
+  -d '{"message":"hello"}'
+```
+
+## Included patterns
+
+- Express 5 with versioned routes
+- Zod environment and request validation
+- Helmet security headers and disabled framework fingerprinting
+- JSON logs with sensitive-header redaction
+- Request correlation through `x-request-id`
+- Stable error envelopes that avoid leaking internals
+- Separate liveness and readiness endpoints
+- Bounded JSON bodies and configurable proxy trust
+- Graceful `SIGTERM`/`SIGINT` shutdown
+- Vitest and Supertest coverage
+- Least-privilege container runtime
+- Dependency-cached GitHub Actions CI
+
+## Response shape
+
+```json
+{
+  "error": {
+    "code": "VALIDATION_ERROR",
+    "message": "Request body is invalid",
+    "requestId": "d36760ab-5a5d-45e3-aaf7-0c58ad6d020e"
+  }
+}
+```
+
+## Production checklist
+
+This starter provides foundations, not a universal security claim. Before launch, add authentication and authorization for your domain, datastore readiness checks, rate limiting at the edge, CORS rules, secret management, observability export, backups, dependency scanning, and a deployment-specific rollback plan.
+
+## Design principles
+
+1. Fail fast when configuration is invalid.
+2. Make every request traceable without logging secrets.
+3. Keep operational probes independent from business routes.
+4. Return useful client errors and private server errors.
+5. Make shutdown behavior explicit and testable.
+
+Built as a public engineering reference by [Manikandan Menon](https://github.com/ManikandaMkM).

SECURITY.md

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+# Security policy
+
+Please report vulnerabilities privately through GitHub's **Report a vulnerability** feature. Do not open a public issue containing exploit details, credentials, or personal data.
+
+This is a generic reference implementation. Review its dependencies, rate limits, authentication, authorization, and data controls for your own threat model before production use.

eslint.config.js

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+import globals from "globals";
+
+export default [{
+  files: ["**/*.js"],
+  languageOptions: { ecmaVersion: "latest", sourceType: "module", globals: globals.node },
+  rules: {
+    "no-unused-vars": ["error", { argsIgnorePattern: "^_" }],
+    "no-console": "error",
+    eqeqeq: ["error", "always"],
+  },
+}];