How to host a Node.Js application in shared hosting

You can run node.js server on a typical shared hosting with Linux, Apache and PHP (LAMP). I have successfully installed it, even with NPM, Express and Grunt working fine. Follow the steps:

1) Create a new PHP file on the server with the following code and run it:

<?php
//Download and extract the latest node
exec('curl http://nodejs.org/dist/latest/node-v0.10.33-linux-x86.tar.gz | tar xz');
//Rename the folder for simplicity
exec('mv node-v0.10.33-linux-x86 node');

2) The same way install your node app, e.g. jt-js-sample, using npm:

<?php
exec('node/bin/npm install jt-js-sample');

3) Run the node app from PHP:

<?php
//Choose JS file to run
$file = 'node_modules/jt-js-sample/index.js';
//Spawn node server in the background and return its pid
$pid = exec('PORT=49999 node/bin/node ' . $file . ' >/dev/null 2>&1 & echo $!');
//Wait for node to start up
usleep(500000);
//Connect to node server using cURL
$curl = curl_init('http://127.0.0.1:49999/');
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_HEADER, 1);
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
//Get the full response
$resp = curl_exec($curl);
if($resp === false) {
    //If couldn't connect, try increasing usleep
    echo 'Error: ' . curl_error($curl);
} else {
    //Split response headers and body
    list($head, $body) = explode("\r\n\r\n", $resp, 2);
    $headarr = explode("\n", $head);
    //Print headers
    foreach($headarr as $headval) {
        header($headval);
    }
    //Print body
    echo $body;
}
//Close connection
curl_close($curl);
//Close node server
exec('kill ' . $pid);

Voila! Have a look at the demo of a node app on PHP shared hosting.

EDIT: I started a Node.php project on GitHub.

I installed Node.js on bluehost.com (a shared server) using:

wget <path to download file>
tar -xf <gzip file>
mv <gzip_file_dir> node

This will download the tar file, extract to a directory and then rename that directory to the name 'node' to make it easier to use.

then

./node/bin/npm install jt-js-sample

Returns: npm WARN engine jt-js-sample@0.2.4: wanted: {"node":"0.10.x"} (current: {"node":"0.12.4","npm":"2.10.1"}) jt-js-sample@0.2.4 node_modules/jt-js-sample └── express@4.12.4 (merge-descriptors@1.0.0, utils-merge@1.0.0, cookie-signature@1.0.6, methods@1.1.1, cookie@0.1.2, fresh@0.2.4, escape-html@1.0.1, range-parser@1.0.2, finalhandler@0.3.6, content-type@1.0.1, vary@1.0.0, parseurl@1.3.0, serve-static@1.9.3, content-disposition@0.5.0, path-to-regexp@0.1.3, depd@1.0.1, qs@2.4.2, on-finished@2.2.1, debug@2.2.0, etag@1.6.0, proxy-addr@1.0.8, send@0.12.3, type-is@1.6.2, accepts@1.2.7)

I can now use the commands:

# ~/node/bin/node -v
v0.12.4

# ~/node/bin/npm -v
2.10.1

For security reasons, I have renamed my node directory to something else.

You should look for a hosting company that provides such feature, but standard simple static+PHP+MySQL hosting won't let you use node.js.

You need either find a hosting designed for node.js or buy a Virtual Private Server and install it yourself.