If you’re developing html / javascript applications and want to test locally, many times you will go beyond what local file access (file:///C:/…) in browsers will allow (like XMLHttpRequests, json calls, cross domain access and Access-Control-Allow-Origin restrictions).

A simple solution instead of deploying your code to apache or IIS is to install a local http server. http-server for Node.js is a fast, easy install and app that will allow you to use any directory as a http://localhost.

Installing this simple http server only takes a few steps:

1. Install node.js if you don’t already have installed (from http://nodejs.org)
2. In a command prompt / terminal, now run:

   npm install http-server -g
   

   (this installs http-server globally so you can access from any folder or directory)

3. Now using command prompt or terminal, browser to a folder with some html you want to serve as http. (ie: c:\someproject\).
4. Run:

   http-server
   

5. Open your browser and visit http://localhost:8080.

 

You can change port 8080 (the default) to anything using “-p”, so http-server -p 8088 would change your local site to http://localhost:8088

Run http-server –help to see the other options available for running.