In addition to fhc, Node.js and NPM, other development tools are required.

sudo npm install -g grunt-cli

Create a new directory to house your project development:

mkdir helloworld
cd helloworld

Clone the source code for all apps in your project using fhc projects clone <project-guid>, for example:

fhc projects clone XME5iUr2VoBV3DbXrVF7qApG  # <== Replace this projectId with your projectId

An output message is displayed, for example:

Cloning into 'helloWorld-Hello-World-Cloud-App'...

Cloning into 'helloWorld-Hello-World-Client'...

Once complete, check what new directories were created:

ls

helloWorld-Hello-World-Client   helloWorld-Hello-World-Cloud-App

If you want to use code from a remote repository, for example https://github.com/evanshortiss/rhmap-express-template, complete the following procedure:

You can now develop your app and push the results to RHMAP.

The two methods for accessing Cloud Apps are:

fhc app hosts --app=<app-guid> --env=<some-env>

{
  "url": "https://testing-3utxgzhawprfqot3tya04v5i-example.feedhenry.com"
}

cd <PROJECT-DIR>/helloWorld-Hello-World-Cloud-App

npm install

grunt serve

Running "env:local" (env) task

Running "concurrent:serve" (concurrent) task
Running "watch" task
Waiting...
Running "nodemon:dev" (nodemon) task
[nodemon] v1.0.20
[nodemon] to restart at any time, enter `rs`
[nodemon] watching: *.*
[nodemon] starting `node application.js`
App started at: Tue Sep 30 2014 15:39:07 GMT+0100 (IST) on port: 8001

curl -X POST http://localhost:8001/hello?hello=world

{"msg":"Hello world"}

grunt serve     # run you server locally with 'live reload'
grunt test      # run your tests locally
grunt coverage  # run your tests with code coverage

Run the Client App locally:

cd <PROJECT-DIR>/helloWorld-Hello-World-Client

Install all the dependancies for the Client App - mainly around grunt:

npm install

Start up a web browser session:

grunt serve:local

grunt serve:local attempts to contact a local Node.js Cloud App on port 8001 by default. A similar message is displayed:

Running "serve:local" (serve) task

Running "clean:server" (clean) task

Running "connect:livereload" (connect) task
Started connect web server on http://localhost:9002

Running "watch" task
Waiting...

See the local README.md for the 'Hello World Client' Template App to learn more.

MBaaS Services are Node.js applications. MBaaS Services can be used by projects to integrate with back-end systems, for example, an Oracle integration service. MBaaS Services are associated with one or more projects and must be made available to apps otherwise an app in a project cannot access the MBaaS Service. For more information on MBaaS Services, see the relevant product documentation.

Services are invoked from a Cloud App via the $fh.service Cloud API call, for example:

$fh.service({
  guid: "PFi1ftKRBvlp-qSmgdcOeGe3",
  path: "/hello",
  method: "GET",
  params: {
    "hello": "world"
  }
}, function(err, data) {
  if (err) {
    return console.log(err);
  }
  return console.log(data);
});

To interact with an MBaaS Service from a local development environment, a mapping is required between:

A new environment variable definition in the Gruntfile.js is required:

env : {
  options : {},
  // environment variables - see https://github.com/jsoverson/grunt-env for more information
  local: {
    FH_USE_LOCAL_DB: true,
    FH_SERVICE_MAP: function() {
      /*
       * Define the mappings for your services here - for local development.
       * You must provide a mapping for each service you wish to access
       * This can be a mapping to a locally running instance of the service (for local development)
       * or a remote instance.
       */
      var serviceMap = {
        'PFi1ftKRBvlp-qSmgdcOeGe3': 'http://127.0.0.1:8010'
      };
      return JSON.stringify(serviceMap);
    }
  }
},

In the above example, FH_SERVICE_MAP is added to the local environment variable definitions. The new variable is mapped to a function and stores the GUID PFi1ftKRBvlp-qSmgdcOeGe3 which points to a service running locally on port 8010. To target a hosted instance of the service, use the Current Host URL of the service, found on the Details page in the Studio. All additional services are added to the serviceMap variable.

Users can define the service mappings as a standard JSON object rather than as a stringified JSON object. FH_SERVICE_MAP environment variable is set using a standard JSON object in the following example:

FH_SERVICE_MAP: '{"PFi1ftKRBvlp-qSmgdcOeGe3":"http://127.0.0.1:8010"}'

A working example can be seen here.

Navigate to the Cloud App directory and open ./lib/hello.js.

To add an additional parameter that sets the current time in the response, input a new parameter to both the GET and POST request. Replace both occurrences of:

res.json({msg: 'Hello ' + world});

with:

res.json({msg: 'Hello ' + world, 'timestamp': new Date().getTime() });

The will add a timestamp with the current time in milliseconds to the response. The reason there are two occurrences is that we have a route handler for both GET and POST requests.

Your Cloud App should automatically restart as soon as the file is saved. After saving the file, re execute the previous curl command:

curl -X POST http://localhost:8001/hello?hello=world

The response now includes a timestamp:

{"msg":"Hello World","timestamp":1412111429480}

Navigate to your Client App directory and open ./www/index.html. This is a basic web-page with an input field for a "name" and a button to call the Cloud. There is also a cloudResponse div that is used to populate the response from the Cloud Call.

Directly under the code "cloudResponse":

<div id="cloudResponse"></div>

Add a timestamp div:

<div id="timestamp"></div>

In ./www/hello.js, a click handler is assigned to the "Say Hello" button. When triggered, the Cloud App’s /hello endpoint is called using the $fh.cloud API.

To cater for the timestamp, open ./www/hello.js and directly under the code:

document.getElementById('cloudResponse').innerHTML = "<p>" + res.msg + "</p>";

Add this code:

document.getElementById('timestamp').innerHTML = "<p>" + new Date(res.timestamp) + "</p>";

Execute the following command in the client directory and also in the cloud directory:

git commit -am"Add timestamp parameter"
git push origin master

The changes made locally are now visible within the App Studio.

For advanced development that makes use of MBaaS APIs, for example, fh.db() and fh.cache(), additional software is required.