Configuration Reference

Every project created with Express Forge uses a centralized configuration system powered by environment variables.

🌍 Environment Variables

Create a .env file in the root of your project.

Variable	Description	Default	Required
PORT	The port the server listens on	3000	No
NODE_ENV	development, production, test	development	No
DATABASE_URL	Connection string for your DB	-	Yes*
LOG_LEVEL	fatal, error, warn, info, debug, trace	debug	No
CORS_ORIGIN	Allowed origins (comma separated)	*	No
RATE_LIMIT_MAX	Max requests per window	100	No
RATE_LIMIT_WINDOW	Window size in minutes	15	No

*Required if an ORM is selected.

⚙️ App Configuration

Configuration is managed in src/config/index.ts. This file:

1. Validates environment variables using Zod.
2. Exports a typed configuration object.
3. Provides default values for optional variables.

💾 Database Config

If you chose Prisma, your configuration is primarily in prisma/schema.prisma.

For Sequelize, configuration is found in src/config/database.ts, which handles the connection pooling and dialect-specific settings.

📝 Logger Config

Logging configuration is found in src/config/logger.ts. You can toggle between pretty-print (for development) and JSON (for production) logging here.