webpack using with nodejs

First of all your webpack configuration will not run on webpack 2+, because webpack-validator is deprecated, so I have removed it. I would recommend you to install npm install webpack-dev-server -g globally and use it as a server in your react development. This is how you can modify your configuration to use it (webpack.config.js):

const path = require("path");
const webpack = require('webpack');
const {getIfUtils, removeEmpty} = require('webpack-config-utils');

module.exports = env => {
  const {ifProd, ifNotProd} = getIfUtils(env)

  return {
    entry: [
      "webpack-dev-server/client?http://localhost:3003",
      "webpack/hot/only-dev-server",
      "react-hot-loader/patch"
    ],
    context: __dirname,
    output: {
      path: path.join(__dirname, './build'),
      filename: 'bundle.js',
      publicPath: '/build/',
      pathinfo: ifNotProd(),
    },
    devtool: ifProd('source-map', 'eval'),
    devServer: {
        contentBase: path.join(__dirname, "src"),
        // enable HMR
        hot: true,
        // embed the webpack-dev-server runtime into the bundle
        inline: true,
        // serve index.html in place of 404 responses to allow HTML5 history
        historyApiFallback: true,
        port: 3003
    },
    module: {
      loaders: [
        {test: /\.js$/, exclude: /node_modules/, loader: 'babel-loader'},
        {test: /\.css$/, loader: 'style-loader!css-loader'},
        {test: /(\.eot|\.woff2|\.woff|\.ttf|\.svg)/, loader: 'file-loader'},
      ],
    },
    plugins: removeEmpty([
    //...
    // same as before
    //...
    ])
  };
};

package.json :

{
  ...
  "dependencies": {},
  "devDependencies": {
    "babel-core": "^6.26.0",
    "babel-loader": "^7.1.2",
    "react-hot-loader": "^3.1.1",
    "webpack": "^3.8.1",
    "webpack-config-utils": "^2.3.0",
    "webpack-dev-server": "^2.9.4",
  }
}

in the same folder where webpack.config.js is make one file webpack.development.js, that will just set enviorment:

var config = require('./webpack.config.js')

module.exports = config("development"); // can be "production" or "development"

Files structure:

root
    build
        bundle.js
    src
        index.html
    index.js
    package.json
    webpack.config.js
    webpack.development.js

At the end just run it: webpack-dev-server --config webpack.development.js --progress -p --hot -w

--hot - will run server, -w - watch files

My suggestion:

package.json scripts (install webpack (-g and –save-dev), nodemon (-g and –save-dev) and concurrently (–save-dev))

  "scripts": {
    "webpack-watch-client": "webpack -w",
    "server": "nodemon server",
    "dev": "concurrently --kill-others \"npm run webpack-watch-client\" \"npm run server\""
  }

webpack.config.js example

'use strict'

const path = require('path');

const PATHS = {
  app: path.join(__dirname, 'src'),
  public: path.join(__dirname, 'public')
};


module.exports = {
  entry: {
    app: PATHS.app,
  },
  output: {
    path: PATHS.public,
    filename: 'js/bundle.js'
  },
  devtool: 'source-map',
  module: {
    rules: [
      {
        test: /\.(js|jsx)$/,
        exclude: /node_modules/,
        use: [
          {
            loader: 'babel-loader',
            options: {
              presets: ['react', 'es2015']
            }
          }
        ]
      },
      {
        test: /\.css$/,
        use: [
          { loader: 'style-loader' },
          { loader: 'css-loader' }
        ]
      },
      {
        test: /\.(woff|woff2|eot|ttf)$/,
        use: [
          {
            loader: 'file-loader',
            options: {
              outputPath: 'assets/fonts/'
            }
          }
        ]
      },
      {
        test: /\.(png|jpg|gif|svg)$/,
        use: [
          {
            loader: 'file-loader',
            options: {
              outputPath: 'assets/img/'
            }
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  },
 plugins: [
// plugins
  ]
};

Node server start point is ./server.js

React client start point is ./src/index.js

Output path ./public contain index.html with lines:

  <div id="root"></div>
  <script type="text/javascript" src="/js/bundle.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Output path for bundle.js is ./public/js

Output path for fonts is ./public/assets/fonts

Output path for images is ./public/assets/img

Start: npm run dev (listening port is defined in server.js)

etc.

I don't know if this would help, but i think that you want do the other way round:

1. Create your configuration un Webpack.config file (Webpack).
2. Your webpack file lauch the Node server (Express).
3. Your server return your font-end file (React).

You can learn some info about webpack in this post.

Try this. Save this code in webpackConfig.js

var webpack = require('webpack')

var config = require('./your_config')

var compiler = webpack(config)

compiler.run(function(err, stats){
   console.log(err, stats)
})

run with "node webpackConfig.js"