# Basic Node.js Concepts for a Beginner (Part 1)

[Node.js®](https://nodejs.org/en/) is a JavaScript runtime built on Chrome's V8 JavaScript engine. The V8 engine compiles JavaScript into machine code in the browser. Node.js is written in C++ and it wraps the V8 engine.

Node.js adds more features to JavaScript as it allows to:
- read & write files on a computer
- connect to a database
- acts as a server for content

On a website, Node.js runs JavaScript on the backend in order to handle requests coming from a browser. It's an alternative to other server-side languages like PHP, Python, Ruby, etc, and enables you to share code between frontend and backend. It also has a huge community and other third party packages & tools to help you in development e.g Express. 

Install Node.js on your computer. You can download or update to the latest version [here](https://nodejs.org/en/)! (you can check the version number installed)

```
node -v 
``` 

*Here are the JavaScript & other Concepts you should be familiar with before diving into Node.js*:

- Functional programming- pure & impure functions
- Asynchronous JavaScript using the promises(.then or async & await) 
- general knowledge of HTML & CSS as Node.js projects might use their templates to create a website.

I will be continuing with the other main JavaScript concepts needed in order to start-off with Node.js IN Part 2 of this article. Thank you for taking the time to read this hopefully it will be of help.