Proper way to set response status and JSON content in a REST API made with nodejs and express

Question

I am playing around with Nodejs and express by building a small rest API. My question is, what is the good practice/best way to set the code status, as well as the response

Answer 1

status of 200 will be the default when using res.send, res.json, etc.

You can set the status like res.status(500).json({ error: 'something is wrong' });

Often I'll do something like...

router.get('/something', function(req, res, next) {
  // Some stuff here
  if(err) {
    res.status(500);
    return next(err);
  }
  // More stuff here
});

Then have my error middleware send the response, and do anything else I need to do when there is an error.

Additionally: res.sendStatus(status) has been added as of version 4.9.0 http://expressjs.com/4x/api.html#res.sendStatus