How to override node.js http to use proxy for all outgoing requests

Question

I recently created a node.js application that accesses social networking sites and caches our public channels. I use some existing npm modules to facilitate access to api on social networks. It works like a charm in my dev environment, but in our production environment requests fail because they need to go through a proxy.

Without the need to modify npm modules, how can I get outgoing requests to go through a proxy?

Answer 1

Use the http.globalAgent property. This will allow you to intercept all requests running in your process. You can then modify these requests for proper formatting for the proxy server.

http://nodejs.org/api/http.html#http_http_globalagent

Another option is to create a proxy exception for this application.

Answer 2

There is an npm module for this:

https://www.npmjs.com/package/global-tunnel

var globalTunnel = require('global-tunnel'); globalTunnel.initialize({ host: '10.0.0.10', port: 8080, sockets: 50 // optional pool size for each http and https }); 

Or, if you want to proxy specific requests, you can use the tunnel package (which is the driving force behind the global tunnel above):

https://www.npmjs.com/package/tunnel

 var tunnel = require('tunnel'); // create the agent var tunnelingAgent = tunnel.httpsOverHttps({ proxy: { host: 'localhost', port: 3128 } }); var req = https.request({ host: 'example.com', port: 443, // pass the agent in your request options agent: tunnelingAgent });