TypeError: Missing parameter name at 2: https://git.new/pathToRegexpError

[eru123]

Environment information

Version: v5.1.0

Platform: Linux 6.8.0-1021-aws 23~22.04.1-Ubuntu SMP Tue Dec 10 16:50:46 UTC 2024 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Node.js version: v16.20.2

Any other relevant information: N/A

What steps will reproduce the bug?

# Installing the latest express cause the issue
npm install express

then throws error

TypeError: Missing parameter name at 2: https://git.new/pathToRegexpError
    at name (/var/www/<project>/node_modules/path-to-regexp/dist/index.js:73:19)
    at lexer (/var/www/<project>/node_modules/path-to-regexp/dist/index.js:91:27)
    at lexer.next (<anonymous>)
    at Iter.peek (/var/www/<project>/node_modules/path-to-regexp/dist/index.js:106:38)
    at Iter.tryConsume (/var/www/<project>/node_modules/path-to-regexp/dist/index.js:112:28)
    at Iter.text (/var/www/<project>/node_modules/path-to-regexp/dist/index.js:128:30)
    at consume (/var/www/<project>/node_modules/path-to-regexp/dist/index.js:152:29)
    at parse (/var/www/<project>/node_modules/path-to-regexp/dist/index.js:183:20)
    at /var/www/<project>/node_modules/path-to-regexp/dist/index.js:294:74
    at Array.map (<anonymous>)
/var/www/<project>/node_modules/path-to-regexp/dist/index.js:73
            throw new TypeError(`Missing parameter name at ${i}: ${DEBUG_URL}`);

Temporary Fix

Downgrade to 4.21.2

npm install express@4.21.2

[MrShadow50]

yes I got also same issue

[slagiewka]

I you go to the DEBUG_URL: https://git.new/pathToRegexpError

You will see in the README:

Missing parameter name
Parameter names must be provided after : or *, and they must be a valid JavaScript identifier. If you want an parameter name that isn't a JavaScript identifier, such as starting with a number, you can wrap the name in quotes like :"my-name".

I would assume that your route contains *. Please confer the migration guide before opening issues: https://expressjs.com/en/guide/migrating-5.html#path-syntax

PS: Node.js version: v16.20.2 please note that express v5 requires node v18. Also note that node v16 has ben EoL since September 11th, 2023.

[wesleytodd]

Yep, as @slagiewka says, please read our migration guide. v5 is a breaking upgrade, and you will need to make some changes to the path syntax you use. If you still think this is a bug after addressing the changes from the guide, please post the route definitions you have and we can take a look. I will leave this open only because I anticipate more folks asking the same question, but will remove the bug label as this is likely not a bug.

[NetWin]

I had this problem aswell and can confirm that this is "simply" a breaking change from the V5 update.
As described in the changelogs here routes like app.use('/**', ...) are not supported anymore.

This problem came up while updating express in an Angular SSR application for me. When setting up SSR, Angular generated exactly the example mentioned above for me. But changing it to app.use('/{*path}', ...) fixed the problem for me. 👍

Screenshot from the migration section of the express homepage:

[eru123]

Thanks @wesleytodd and @slagiewka, I confirmed that it is a breaking issue with the new version.

As for our usecase we only have this one route, that accepts all requests and send in the index.html of our frontend build, and you guys are correct, this one is causing the issue.

app.get('/*', function (req, res) {
  res.sendFile(path.join(__dirname, '../build', 'index.html'));
});

I opened this issue yesterday because we have to rollback our production and it cost us downtime and delay our app release thinking it's a fault on our recent changes.

Funny enough, it's our mistake, we have this untouched code in our Dockerfile for ~5 years now and a package-lock.json is not generated until deployment as we do the expressjs installation on docker build, basically it's always installing the latest version 😭.

RUN npm install express

With this, I conclude that this issue is resolved, you guys can close this anytime if no one wants to add more. I just hope no major impact to production servers out there because of silly mistakes like what we did.

[MrShadow50]

@eru123 same with me I am using express to serve my react build and last 3-year code was working but because I also face same issue after this critical issue, I realize does not matter how much contributor are working on any lib it can have major issue after whole application.

[wesleytodd]

This is true of all libraries, you have benefited these past years from the stability (and stagnation 😉) of the project. If you are doing something like npm install express in your build you need to specify a version you rely on. Change that to npm install express@5 now and then when we release v6 which will also include breaking changes you will avoid this pain.

I will still keep this open for now, because it avoids more duplicate issues, but glad to hear your issue is resolved @eru123!

[wesleytodd]

In fact, I just pinned this issue so that folks are more likely to see it than to open a new one.