A comprehensive, industry-standard Node.js Full Syllabus

Module 1: JavaScript Prerequisites for Backend

  • Modern ES6+ Features: Destructuring, rest/spread operators, template literals, optional chaining, nullish coalescing.
  • Asynchronous JavaScript: Callbacks, callback hell, Promises, async/await, and error handling with try...catch.
  • Execution Context: Scope, closures, the this keyword, and the JavaScript runtime model.

Module 2: Node.js Runtime & Architecture

  • Internal Architecture: V8 engine, libuv, thread pool, event loop, and non-blocking I/O.
  • Event Loop Phases: Timers, pending callbacks, idle/prepare, poll, check (setImmediate), and close callbacks.
  • Microtask Queue vs. Macrotask Queue: process.nextTick() vs. resolved Promises.
  • Global Objects: global, process, __dirname, __filename, and CLI execution.
  • Module Systems: CommonJS (require, module.exports) vs. ES Modules (import, export).

Module 3: Node Package Manager (NPM / PNPM / Yarn)

  • Package Management: package.json, package-lock.json, semantic versioning (^, ~), local vs. global dependencies.
  • Scripts & Workflows: Custom npm scripts, environment-specific runs, and npx.
  • Managing Secrets: Working with .env files and dotenv.

Module 4: Core Node.js Built-in Modules

  • File System (fs & fs/promises): Reading, writing, appending, updating, and deleting files; sync vs. async operations.
  • Path Module (path): Resolving absolute/relative paths, path traversal defense, normalization.
  • Events (EventEmitter): Custom event creation, listening, emitting, and memory leak handling (removeListener, once).
  • Buffers & Streams:
    • Binary data handling with Buffer.
    • Stream types: Readable, Writable, Duplex, Transform.
    • Handling backpressure, piping (stream.pipeline), and chunk-by-chunk processing.
  • OS & HTTP: os module utilities and building a bare-bones HTTP server using node:http.

Module 5: Web Frameworks & RESTful APIs (Express.js)

  • Express Basics: App setup, routing, request/response cycle, URL parameters, query strings, and body parsing.
  • Middleware Architecture: Built-in, application-level, router-level, error-handling middleware, and third-party libraries (e.g., cors, morgan).
  • REST API Design: HTTP verbs, standardized status codes, versioning (/api/v1), and idempotency.
  • Architecture Pattern: Model-View-Controller (MVC) or Layered Architecture (Controller-Service-Repository).
  • Data Validation & Sanitization: Schema validation with libraries like Zod or Joi.
  • File Handling: Multi-part form data uploads using multer.

Module 6: Database Integration

  • NoSQL (MongoDB):
    • MongoDB basics, document structures, and indexing.
    • Object Data Modeling (ODM) with Mongoose: Schemas, models, validations, middleware (pre/post hooks), and population. euphoriagenx.com
  • Relational Databases (PostgreSQL / MySQL):
    • Relational schema design, transactions, and foreign keys.
    • ORMs / Query Builders: Prisma, Drizzle, or TypeORM.
  • In-Memory Caching:
    • Redis: Key-value caching, session storage, and rate limiting.

Module 7: Authentication, Authorization & Security

  • Authentication Strategies:
    • Password hashing with bcrypt or argon2.
    • Stateless token authentication with JSON Web Tokens (JWT).
    • Stateful session-based auth with cookies (httpOnly, SameSite, Secure). ProCodrr
    • OAuth 2.0 integration (e.g., Google login with Passport.js).
  • Authorization: Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) and permission middleware.
  • Backend Security:
    • Setting HTTP security headers using helmet.
    • Protection against SQL Injection, NoSQL Injection, XSS, CSRF, and timing attacks.
    • Rate-limiting and DDoS mitigation using express-rate-limit and Redis.

Module 8: Real-Time Communication & Background Tasks

  • WebSockets & Real-Time: Bidirectional communication, rooms, namespaces, and event broadcasting using Socket.io. SourceKode
  • Background Jobs & Message Queues: Offloading heavy workloads and managing cron jobs with BullMQ (Redis-backed) or node-cron. SourceKode
  • Email & Notifications: Sending transactional emails with nodemailer or third-party APIs (Resend, SendGrid). SourceKode

Module 9: Testing & Quality Assurance

  • Unit & Integration Testing: Writing test suites with Jest or Vitest. SourceKode
  • API Testing: Testing HTTP endpoints and payloads with Supertest.
  • Mocking & Spying: Mocking database calls, network requests, and external third-party services.

Module 10: Performance Optimization & Concurrency

  • Multi-Processing:
    • cluster module for utilizing multi-core CPUs.
    • child_process (fork, spawn, exec) for running separate system tasks.
    • worker_threads for CPU-heavy tasks without blocking the main event loop.
  • Memory Management: Identifying memory leaks, profiling with Chrome DevTools/Clinic.js, and garbage collection behavior.

Module 11: Deployment, DevOps & Production Readiness

  • Process Management: Running and monitoring apps with PM2.
  • Containerization: Writing optimized multi-stage Dockerfile configurations and docker-compose.yml for Node, database, and Redis stacks.
  • Logging & Observability: Structured logging with Pino or Winston; APM and health-check endpoints.
  • Deployment Targets: AWS (EC2/ECS/Lambda), DigitalOcean, Render, or Railway; setting up CI/CD pipelines with GitHub Actions.

Recommended Portfolio Projects

  1. REST API with Full Auth & RBAC: Multi-tenant blog or e-commerce API with JWTs, refresh tokens, role checks, and pagination.
  2. Real-Time Collaborative App: Chat application or collaborative document editor with Socket.io and Redis adapters.
  3. High-Throughput File Processor: Video/image transcoding queue or CSV batch importer using streams and background worker queues.