How do you deploy api made with express in create react app - express

Question

I have a simple api created with express.js. When ever i try to push to Heroku it get stuck at this point?
remote: [4/4] Building fresh packages...
remote: Done in 16.30s.
remote:
remote: -----> Build
remote: Running build (yarn)
remote: yarn run v1.22.4
remote: $ node server.js
remote: Server started on port 9000
I also see the same thing in heroku dashboard "View build progress"
here is my package.json
{
"name": "firebase-server",
"version": "1.0.0",
"main": "index.js",
"repository": "##########",
"author": "#######",
"license": "MIT",
"scripts": {
"start": "nodemon --ext js,graphql --ignore data/ server.js",
"build": "node server.js"
},
"dependencies": {
"#firebase/app": "^0.6.7",
"#firebase/component": "^0.1.15",
"apollo-server-express": "^2.15.1",
"body-parser": "^1.19.0",
"cors": "^2.8.5",
"express": "^4.17.1",
"express-jwt": "^6.0.0",
"firebase": "^7.15.5",
"graphql": "^15.3.0",
"jsonwebtoken": "^8.5.1",
"notarealdb": "^0.2.2"
},
"devDependencies": {
"nodemon": "^2.0.4"
}
}
the only thing i have in this project is my server.js. what am i missing or not doing. Basically i trying to deploy this to have a live API for my project. it is working locally but now i would like to have it working live on heroku.

Answer 1

With Heroku, the build script is used if you need to customize your build options (e.g. if you're using WebPack or TypeScript). The issue is that you're using a script called build, which you're expecting to start the application. It's running that script, as it promises to do, but since it's starting the application, it'll "hang forever" from your point of view.
If you change your scripts to this, I think this will solve your issues. Locally, you would use npm local for nodemon, and npm start would start the app on Heroku.
{
"scripts": {
"local": "nodemon --ext js,graphql --ignore data/ server.js",
"start": "node server.js"
},
}