# New to Ember (et. al), looking for resources to accomplish some specific things

**URL:** <https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479>\
**Category:** Uncategorized\
**Created:** [October 11, 2014, 5:37pm UTC](https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479 "2014-10-11T17:37:17Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 8\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![CashewGuy](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/discuss.emberjs.com/cashewguy/32/9649_2.png) [@CashewGuy](https://discuss.emberjs.com/u/CashewGuy)\
**Post date:** [October 11, 2014, 5:37pm UTC](https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479/1 "2014-10-11T17:37:17Z")

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Firstly, I’m not sure what category this should go in. My first instinct was “Design” but since I have questions about Ember-Data as well, I’ll leave it as uncategorized.

I really like Ember. I spent the last few days experimenting with it, and I’m putting myself through “Code College” today. Basically, any time I need to learn something new (or a group of new things), I’ll set aside a day to do nothing but watch tutorials or read articles (possibly do some demos as well).

The project I’m building right now (just for myself), is essentially a reference engine. Data is put in through a form, saved to a database, and searchable. There are a million ways to do that, but I wanted to use Ember and some other newer/unfamiliar things to teach myself.

What I want / think I want to use:  
EmberJS, for building the app.  
Handlebars for templating (different kinds of data = different template).  
Foundation for layout/grids.  
Showdown to convert Markdown data entry to HTML.  
Moment for dates.  
MongoDB as a database.  
NodeJS / Express to run the server / query+retrieve from the DB.

Where I’m having trouble is figuring out how Express, Ember, and Node fit in together, or if I’m using three things where I only need to use one. (I mainly like Express for it’s express-generate stuff). Needless to say, I have very little experience with running server side javascript. I’ve found various different resources (I’m working my way through a bunch of Tuts+ courses on Ember, Express, Node, and Mongo right now), but I was wondering if anyone had some commentary on what I’m trying to do. It seems like using Ember+Express+Node to query/read/write to a DB would be massive overkill.

I’ve also read some things about Ember-Data, but I don’t really understand what it is. Perhaps it’s exactly what I need.

So…

Does anyone have any resources on using these tools together, or suggestions on how to get what I’m trying to do done? This is all a learning project, so it’s nothing too serious.

Thanks!

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**Author:** ![broerse](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/discuss.emberjs.com/broerse/32/9497_2.png) [@broerse](https://discuss.emberjs.com/u/broerse)\
**Post date:** [October 11, 2014, 6:28pm UTC](https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479/2 "2014-10-11T18:28:57Z")

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I am a beginner too. I think you are better of if you start with [http://www.ember-cli.com/](http://www.ember-cli.com/) My working example that uses moment, marked (it supports tables in markdown better than Showdown) can be downloaded here: [GitHub - broerse/ember-cli-blog: Tom Dale's blog example updated for the Ember CLI](https://github.com/broerse/ember-cli-blog)

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**Author:** ![Leeft](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/discuss.emberjs.com/leeft/32/10094_2.png) [@Leeft](https://discuss.emberjs.com/u/Leeft)\
**Post date:** [October 11, 2014, 10:06pm UTC](https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479/3 "2014-10-11T22:06:01Z")

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I can’t help you with the specific questions, because I’ve not used MongoDB together with Ember, nor have I used Express. But I can offer another suggestion:

We’re using ember-cli + ember-data + Firebase, where Firebase provides the NoSQL backend and also the hosting. Some queries are currently difficult to achieve in Firebase, but using these tools together properly still make for a very easy ecosystem to get started with. Firebase integrates well with ember-data (you can also use it without, though you’ll have an easier time not trying to bypass ember-data). Firebase uses websockets behind the scenes, and provides real-time two way communication so your updates propagate to others right away, which is extremely cool.

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**Author:** ![CashewGuy](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/discuss.emberjs.com/cashewguy/32/9649_2.png) [@CashewGuy](https://discuss.emberjs.com/u/CashewGuy)\
**Post date:** [October 12, 2014, 4:02am UTC](https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479/4 "2014-10-12T04:02:21Z")

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I’m looking to avoid Firebase, since using it would sort of be a “cheat” - part of the project is trying to learn how Mongo, Express, and Ember all interact. This isn’t for production, just to learn.

As a general update, I’m a lot farther along now than I was this morning. I understand how Express deals with things, but Express itself comes with a lot of front-end stuff that I don’t want.

For instance, I basically _only_ want Express to connect to the DB and grab the info, then hand it off to Ember.

I want to use Ember and Handlebars to build the actual app (routes, templating), and I need it to take the info from Express and be able to both read it, and manipulate it.

It’s that bridge that’s giving me trouble. I’m having some trouble **understanding how Ember and Express co-exist, and how they interact**. I think once I get that, I’ll be okay. Anyone have advice on that?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![broerse](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/discuss.emberjs.com/broerse/32/9497_2.png) [@broerse](https://discuss.emberjs.com/u/broerse)\
**Post date:** [October 12, 2014, 6:39am UTC](https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479/5 "2014-10-12T06:39:13Z")

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If you only what to grab data from MongoDB you can use [http://fortunejs.com/](http://fortunejs.com/) , It has CORS enabled. A server looks like this:

```
var fortune = require('fortune')
  , app = fortune({
    db: 'myapp'
  })
  .resource('post', {
    title: String,
    author: String,
    date: Date,
    excerpt: String,
    body: String
  })
  .listen(1337); 

```

You can swap out the default nedb with MongoDB and you will have to use [https://github.com/kurko/ember-json-api](https://github.com/kurko/ember-json-api) to talk to fortune.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![motingandrei7](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/discuss.emberjs.com/motingandrei7/32/9897_2.png) [@motingandrei7](https://discuss.emberjs.com/u/motingandrei7)\
**Post date:** [November 28, 2014, 7:39am UTC](https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479/6 "2014-11-28T07:39:45Z")

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I guess the question remains open. I feel pretty comfortable with Express and Mongo, and I would love to see a source on integrating those two with ember. I’m starting out with ember - and I don’t see any tuts, videos or anything on how to make it work together.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![broerse](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/discuss.emberjs.com/broerse/32/9497_2.png) [@broerse](https://discuss.emberjs.com/u/broerse)\
**Post date:** [November 28, 2014, 7:00pm UTC](https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479/7 "2014-11-28T19:00:04Z")

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Perhaps use: [GitHub - ethanresnick/json-api: Turn your node app into a JSON API server (http://jsonapi.org/)](https://github.com/ethanresnick/json-api) and [https://github.com/kurko/ember-json-api](https://github.com/kurko/ember-json-api)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![motingandrei7](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/discuss.emberjs.com/motingandrei7/32/9897_2.png) [@motingandrei7](https://discuss.emberjs.com/u/motingandrei7)\
**Post date:** [November 29, 2014, 2:02am UTC](https://discuss.emberjs.com/t/new-to-ember-et-al-looking-for-resources-to-accomplish-some-specific-things/6479/8 "2014-11-29T02:02:40Z")

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Apparently I’m not as comfortable as I thought I am.