server.js

/*
NodeJS Static Http Server - http://github.com/thedigitalself/node-static-http-server/
By James Wanga - The Digital Self
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

A simple, nodeJS, http development server that trivializes serving static files.

This server is HEAVILY based on work done by Ryan Florence(https://github.com/rpflorence) (https://gist.github.com/701407). I merged this code with suggestions on handling varied MIME types found at Stackoverflow (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7268033/basic-static-file-server-in-nodejs).

To run the server simply place the server.js file in the root of your web application and issue the command 
$ node server.js 
or 
$ node server.js 1234 
with "1234" being a custom port number"

Your web application will be served at http://localhost:8888 by default or http://localhost:1234 with "1234" being the custom port you passed.

Mime Types:
You can add to the mimeTypes has to serve more file types.

Virtual Directories:
Add to the virtualDirectories hash if you have resources that are not children of the root directory

*/
var http = require("http"),
    url = require("url"),
    path = require("path"),
    fs = require("fs")
    port = process.argv[2] || 8888;

var mimeTypes = {
    "htm": "text/html",
    "html": "text/html",
    "jpeg": "image/jpeg",
    "jpg": "image/jpeg",
    "png": "image/png",
    "gif": "image/gif",
    "js": "text/javascript",
    "css": "text/css"};

var virtualDirectories = {
    //"images": "../images/"
  };

http.createServer(function(request, response) {

  var uri = url.parse(request.url).pathname
    , filename = path.join(process.cwd(), uri)
    , root = uri.split("/")[1]
    , virtualDirectory;
  
  virtualDirectory = virtualDirectories[root];
  if(virtualDirectory){
    uri = uri.slice(root.length + 1, uri.length);
    filename = path.join(virtualDirectory ,uri);
  }

  fs.exists(filename, function(exists) {
    if(!exists) {
      response.writeHead(404, {"Content-Type": "text/plain"});
      response.write("404 Not Found\n");
      response.end();
      console.error('404: ' + filename);
      return;
    }

	if (fs.statSync(filename).isDirectory()) filename += '/index.html';

    fs.readFile(filename, "binary", function(err, file) {
      if(err) {        
        response.writeHead(500, {"Content-Type": "text/plain"});
        response.write(err + "\n");
        response.end();
        console.error('500: ' + filename);
        return;
      }

      var mimeType = mimeTypes[path.extname(filename).split(".")[1]];
      response.writeHead(200, {"Content-Type": mimeType});
      response.write(file, "binary");
      response.end();
      console.log('200: ' + filename + ' as ' + mimeType);
    });
  });
}).listen(parseInt(port, 10));

console.log("Static file server running at\n  => http://localhost:" + port + "/\nCTRL + C to shutdown");