To elaborate on what @Raynos said, the function you have defined is an asynchronous callback. It doesn't execute right away, rather it executes when the file loading has completed. When you call readFile, control is returned immediately and the next line of code is executed. So when you call console.log, your callback has not yet been invoked, and this content has not yet been set. Welcome to asynchronous programming.

Example approaches

var content;
// First I want to read the file
fs.readFile('./Index.html', function read(err, data) {
    if (err) {
        throw err;
    }
    content = data;

    // Invoke the next step here however you like
    console.log(content);   // Put all of the code here (not the best solution)
    processFile();          // Or put the next step in a function and invoke it
});

function processFile() {
    console.log(content);
}

Or better yet, as Raynos example shows, wrap your call in a function and pass in your own callbacks. (Apparently this is better practice) I think getting into the habit of wrapping your async calls in function that takes a callback will save you a lot of trouble and messy code.

function doSomething (callback) {
    // any async callback invokes callback with response
}

doSomething (function doSomethingAfter(err, result) {
    // process the async result
});

There is actually a Synchronous function for this:

http://nodejs.org/api/fs.html#fs_fs_readfilesync_filename_encoding

Asynchronous

fs.readFile(filename, [encoding], [callback])

Asynchronously reads the entire contents of a file. Example:

fs.readFile('/etc/passwd', function (err, data) {
  if (err) throw err;
  console.log(data);
});

The callback is passed two arguments (err, data), where data is the contents of the file.

If no encoding is specified, then the raw buffer is returned.

---

SYNCHRONOUS

fs.readFileSync(filename, [encoding])

Synchronous version of fs.readFile. Returns the contents of the filename.

If encoding is specified then this function returns a string. Otherwise it returns a buffer.

var text = fs.readFileSync('test.md','utf8')
console.log (text)

function readContent(callback) {
    fs.readFile("./Index.html", function (err, content) {
        if (err) return callback(err)
        callback(null, content)
    })
}

readContent(function (err, content) {
    console.log(content)
})

As said, fs.readFile is an asynchronous action. that means that when you tell node to read a file, you need to consider that it will take some time and in the meantime, node continues to run the following code. in your case it's: console.log(content);.

It's like sending some part of node for a long trip (like reading a big file).

take a look at my comments:

var content;

// node, go fetch this file. when you come back, please run this "read" callback function
fs.readFile('./Index.html', function read(err, data) {
    if (err) {
        throw err;
    }
    content = data;
});

// in the meantime, please continue and run this console.log
console.log(content);

that's why content is still empty when you log it. node has not yet retrieved the file's content.

This could be resolved by moving console.log(content) inside the callback function, right after content = data;. this way you will see the log when node is done reading the file and after content gets a value.

var data = fs.readFileSync('tmp/reltioconfig.json','utf8');

use this for calling a file synchronously, without encoding its showing output as a buffer.