systeminformation-api

System Information API

This is a thin wrapper around systeminformation to expose it as a REST API.

Dependencies

You have to have node.js and npm setup. Uses express to create minimal web service and minimist to process command line argument. For testing I rely on mocha/chai/chai-http. All the dependencies are automatically installed by npm - see below.

How to Use it

Download

Clone or download it from git hub:

git clone https://github.com/asokolsky/systeminformation-api.git

or just use npm to download and install it:

npm i systeminformation-api

Build

Run in the shell in the directory where you cloned systeminformation-api:

npm install

Test

in the shell:

node test

Run

and then in the shell

node index.js

Finally, point your browser http://localhost:3000/api/systeminformation/cpu

Command Line

node index.js [{-p|--port}:<portnumber>] [-z|--zip] [-h|--help] [-v|--version]

• {-p|--port}:<port> - specifies port on which the service will listen for incoming HTTP connections
• -z|--zip - will force express to use gzip encoding - experimental, not for production
• -h|--help - display command line spec
• -v|--version - show package version

REST APIs Supported

Only HTTP GET is supported.
The URIs start with /api/systeminformation followed by:

• empty string - returns systeminformation package version
• time - returns time JSON
• system
• bios
• baseboard
• cpu
• cpuFlags
• cpuCache
• cpuCurrentSpeed
• cpuTemperature
• mem
• memLayout
• diskLayout
• battery
• graphics
• osInfo
• versions
• shell
• users
• fsSize
• blockDevices
• fsStats
• disksIO
• networkInterfaces
• networkInterfaceDefault
• networkStats
• networkConnections
• currentLoad
• fullLoad
• processes
• dockerContainers
• dockerAll
• getStaticData
• getDynamicData

For a full description of the underlying functionality see the systeminformation documentation.

Deploy

Here are the Best Practices.

Debugging

The package relies on (almost standard) debug package. Command line to enable this app trace on Windows (powershell, default in vscode):

$env:DEBUG='siapi';node .\index.js

Try this to learn more about express:

$env:DEBUG='*';node .\index.js

Credits

systeminformation by Sebastian Hildebrandt

TODO

If you have an opinion or ideas on the below list - please do tell.

Logging

Decide on the logging facility to use: https://strongloop.com/strongblog/compare-node-js-logging-winston-bunyan/

Package it as a Service

https://github.com/coreybutler/node-windows

https://github.com/tallesl/qckwinsvc

Package it as a Docker Image

https://nodesource.com/blog/8-protips-to-start-killing-it-when-dockerizing-node-js

DONE

Adopt debug facility

Use debug package instead of console.

Publish it in npm

DONE: https://www.npmjs.com/package/systeminformation-api

Using gzip encoding

Followed the best practices suggestions, adopted optional gzip encoding. Did not benchmark the impact though.