Why can’t Node.js static folder read PHP?

With the continuous development and widespread application of Node.js, more and more developers are beginning to try to use Node.js to develop web applications. At the same time, Node.js is also an excellent static file server, which can help us quickly build a simple and easy-to-use web server. However, recently when using Node.js to build a static file server, I found that the folder containing PHP could not be read, which troubled developers very much. So, why can’t Node.js static folder read PHP?

First of all, we need to understand the nature of Node.js static folder server. In layman's terms, the Node.js static folder server is a service program that can transmit the contents of a local folder to the browser through the HTTP protocol. It can read and transmit various static files including HTML, CSS, JavaScript, images, videos, etc. During development, we can quickly build a simple web server based on the HTTP module of Node.js and use it to distribute static resources.

Unfortunately, in Node.js, for php files, Node.js itself does not have the ability to parse php files, nor can it forward php requests. If we want to use Node.js to process PHP files, we need to use third-party tools, such as CGI (Common Gateway Interface).

The principle of CGI is to run the PHP file in another process and obtain and transmit data through the standard input and output stream. Specifically, it starts an independent PHP process, runs the PHP file in the process, and returns the execution results to the Node.js process for processing. Therefore, CGI allows us to use Node.js to read and transfer PHP files, avoiding the problem that the Node.js static folder server cannot read PHP files.

In addition, another solution is to use Nginx as the gateway for PHP files, and then forward the PHP files to the Node.js server for processing through Proxy requests. Compared with CGI, this method can handle concurrent requests more efficiently, but it requires corresponding Nginx configuration and is slightly complicated to implement.

To sum up, the reason why Node.js static folder cannot read PHP files is that Node.js itself does not have a PHP interpreter and cannot forward PHP requests. To implement Node.js reading PHP files, you can use CGI or Nginx Proxy to achieve forwarding. Of course, for small static file servers, you can also consider separating the PHP folder into another folder when the PHP files are not needed, so that it will not affect the reading and transmission of the Node.js server.

In short, Node.js, as an excellent static file server, has great flexibility and scalability. In the process of using Node.js to build web applications and provide static resource services, we need to flexibly use various technical means according to actual needs and situations to achieve our goals.

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