How to Setup and Configure Parse Server with Parse Dashboard Ubuntu 16.04

Parse Server: 

Parse Server is an open source Backend-as-a-Service(BaaS) framework initially developed by Facebook. The platform now has an active and robust community of fanatical developers

Let's Start installation of Parse server:

Prerequisites:  Before we Start Parse installation we need following prerequisites:

• NodeJS
• MongoDB

Step 1- Install MongoDB:

To install Mongodb at Ubuntu 16.04, Please follow the below link.

How to Install MongoDB 3.x on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

Step 2- Install NodeJS:

NodeJS installation: First we need to add node.js ppa to our system and perform the nodejs installation with python, let's follow the steps below

Install Python properties 

sudo apt-get install build-essential git python-software-properties

ADD NodeJS Repo :

 curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_7.x | sudo -E bash -

Your output should be like below Filtered screenshot 

Install NodeJS:

Please run below command at terminal to start the nodejs installation

apt-get install nodejs

Your installation screen should be like below

Step 3- Download and setup Parse Server:

Now download the parse server from the link below

3A-Change the directory first

root@Server16:~# cd /opt/

3B-Now download parse server

root@Server16:/opt# git clone https://github.com/ParsePlatform/parse-server-example.git

3C-Now Cd to the downloaded folder- parse-server-example and install all nodejs dependencies using command npm install

root@Server16:/opt# cd parse-server-example/
root@Server16:/opt/parse-server-example# npm install

Filtered ouput

3D- Allow User access on the DB- Please skip this step if authentication is not enabled on your mongodb.

If your MongoDB has authentication enabled then we need to setup an account and grant access on db dev

Logon to mongo shell with user have admin level access

mongo -u amar -p

root@Server16:/opt/parse-server-example# mongo -u amar -p
MongoDB shell version v3.6.3
Enter password: *******
connecting to: mongodb://127.0.0.1:27017
MongoDB server version: 3.6.3

Grant permission to user on database dev
Run below script to add user amar and grant readWrite access on db to dev

> use dev
switched to db dev
> db.createUser({user:"amar", pwd:"redhat", roles:[{role:"readWrite", db:"dev"}]})
Successfully added user: {
        "user" : "amar",
        "roles" : [
                {
                        "role" : "readWrite",
                        "db" : "dev"
                }
        ]
}
> exit

3E-To test our setup environment, edit index.js files and update APP_ID, MASTER_KEY and if required SERVER_URL as following. Use any random string for APP_ID and MASTER_KEY

root@Server16:/opt# vi index.js

Modify you file with Mongodb url, App_ID and Master_Key

var databaseUri = 'mongodb://amar:redhat@localhost:27017/dev';
//
//if (!databaseUri) {
 // console.log('DATABASE_URI not specified, falling back to localhost.');
//}

var api = new ParseServer({
  databaseURI: databaseUri || 'mongodb://amar:redhat@localhost:27017/dev',
  cloud: process.env.CLOUD_CODE_MAIN || __dirname + '/cloud/main.js',
  appId: process.env.APP_ID || 'myappkey',
  masterKey: process.env.MASTER_KEY || 'mymasterkey', //Add your master key here. Keep it secret!
  serverURL: process.env.SERVER_URL || 'http://localhost:1337/parse',  // Don't forget to change to https if needed
  liveQuery: {
    classNames: ["Posts", "Comments"] // List of classes to support for query subscriptions
  }
});

Save and Exit from the file

Your index.js file looks like below screenshot.

Step 4- Start Parse Server

After all the configuration changes, let's start the parse server

npm start

root@Server16:/opt/parse-server-example# npm start

> parse-server-example@1.4.0 start /opt/parse-server-example
> node index.js

parse-server-example running on port 1337.

Your terminal output should be similar this 

Parse server installation has completed successfully.

Step 5- keep running parse server in the terminal background

By default npm start command works until you are logged in to terminal, once you interrupt the running process or close the terminal. Your parse server will stop running. Let's use some trick to run npm start command in the background. 

nohup start npm &

Step 6-Test Parse Server:

After setting up all the configuration, let's test parse server. First, add some value to parse server using curl command line. This will connect to parse server and records will be save to mongodb database. Change MyApp_ID with yours

curl -X POST \
  -H "X-Parse-Application-Id: myappkey" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"score":1337,"InventoryName":"Desktops","cheatMode":false}' \
  http://localhost:1337/parse/classes/Inventory

OUTPUT

{"objectId":"UIWRBpyPyy","createdAt":"2018-03-12T10:51:30.639Z"}

Now use following command to fetch values from Parse server.

curl -X GET -H "X-Parse-Application-Id: myappkey"\
  http://localhost:1337/parse/classes/Inventory

OUTPUT

{"results":[{"objectId":"UIWRBpyPyy","score":1337,"InventoryName":"Desktops","cheatMode":false,"createdAt":"2018-03-12T10:51:30.639Z","updatedAt":"2018-03-12T10:51:30.639Z"}]}

Step 7- Start parse server during system boot.
Generally, we can keep running parse server using nohup command. but incase we required a server reboot that time parse server will not come online automatically. let enable this command to run during system boot.

Edit /etc/rc.local File. 

Vi /etc/rc.local

Append following red highligted  line before exit 0

cd /opt/parse-server-example
nohup npm start &
exit 0

Save and exit from the file. Now, parse server will start auto during system boot.

We have successfully installed and configured parse server on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS. Let’s setup Parse Dashboard to access Parse server data.