Host a demo REST API

Want data to play around with in your next egghead lesson?

egghead co-founder and instructor extraordinaire John Lindquist set us up with a REST API using swapi (The Star Wars API) and json-server. As long as you don’t openly endorse or promote swapi (or Star Wars), you’ll have no issues with copyrights.

If you don’t have a need for any special configurations, you can spin up the server using npx.

npx ships with the latest versions of npm, so you probably already have it installed.

$ npx https://github.com/johnlindquist/swapi-json-server // --> http://localhost:3000

💥 Presto. You’re now running a REST API using Star Wars data. 💥

Build custom data for egghead lessons

Of course, you have endless options for building a REST API.

If your data needs to be unique for the lesson you’re crafting (there’s a lesson for that!)

John shows us how to generate a large dataset of JSON data:

100 random people

If 100 random people is enough for your data set, grab this gist: 100 people in JSON format.

Serve JSON locally

json-server will serve any JSON file we have ready.

$ npm i -g json-server

$ json-server {data.json}

You're good to go.

Host a REST API

Zeit's now feature is a great way to host any application needing it.

You can use the now command with an app John set up:

$ npm i -g now $ now https://github.com/johnlindquist/swapi-json-server

If this is your first time using now, there will be a small amount of setup, but overall it's a breeze.

There’s a lesson for that, too. Check out Deploy Web Apps with Zeit Now for an in-depth look at now. Watch it right now!