What is Nova?

Luau is growing. While most of us started using it within the Roblox engine, runtimes like Lune, Zune, and Lute are making it possible to use the language we love for things like CLI tools and web servers.

However, building a web server from scratch can be a bit tedious. You usually have to manually handle request parsing, manage complex routing logic, and figure out how to structure your project so it doesn't become one giant, unreadable file.

Nova is a web framework designed to give you a solid foundation for building APIs in Luau. It brings Filesystem Routing, a concept popular in frameworks like Next.js, to the Luau ecosystem.

How it works

The core idea behind Nova is that your file structure defines your API. Instead of writing code to map every URL to a function, you just organize your files into folders.

• A file at app/route.luau handles requests to /.
• A file at app/users/route.luau handles requests to /users.

This keeps your project organized by default and lets you focus on writing the actual logic of your app.

Key Features

• Filesystem Routing: No manual route registration. Your folders are your paths.
• Runtime Agnostic: Whether you prefer Lune, Zune, or Lute, Nova is built to work across the different Luau runtimes seamlessly.
• Middleware Support: Easily chain logic together (like authentication or logging) before your main code runs.
• Type Safety: Built with Luau’s typing in mind, so you get better autocompletion and fewer runtime errors.

A Simple Example

In Nova, a basic "Hello World" route looks like this:

local Nova = require("path/to/nova")

local Home = {}

-- This function runs when someone sends a GET request to this path
function Home.Get()
    return Nova.response.json({ message = "Hello, world!" })
end

return Home

Why use Nova?

If you're looking to build a web backend for your Roblox game, a custom dashboard, or just want to experiment with Luau outside of the engine, Nova is here to make that process easier. It’s not about making things complicated; it’s about giving you a standard way to build things quickly.