Try running this command in command prompt:

express --help

It will give you the express generator help:

  Usage: express [options] [dir]

  Options:

    -h, --help          output usage information
        --version       output the version number
    -e, --ejs           add ejs engine support
        --hbs           add handlebars engine support
        --pug           add pug engine support
    -H, --hogan         add hogan.js engine support
        --no-view       generate without view engine
    -v, --view <engine> add view <engine> support (ejs|hbs|hjs|jade|pug|twig|vash) (defaults to jade)
    -c, --css <engine>  add stylesheet <engine> support (less|stylus|compass|sass) (defaults to plain css)
        --git           add .gitignore
    -f, --force         force on non-empty directory

^{Source: https://expressjs.com/en/starter/generator.html}

The above options give you the list of "view engines".

Now, simply type:

express -{your choice view engine}

For example using express -e:

This sets the EJS engine as your view handler and removes jade. EJS has the look and feel of HTML with the added ability to inject values via their template system.

If what you want is directly to serve static html files with the possibility to cache resources, while still being able to hit "/" and get index.html, then the answer is as easy as this:

var express = require('express');
var http = require('http');
var app = express();

app.use(express.static(__dirname + '/public'));

http.createServer(app).listen(3000);

Gotcha: Html files including index.html must be inside /public folder instead of /views

My wild guess is that '-e' does what it says, It adds ejs as view engine, maybe because its the most popular so you dont have to write '-v ejs' .. but im purely guessing now based on the manual you provided.

Passing this as the answer

Try res.sendFile(path.join(__dirname + '/../public/index.html'))

If you are using Angular, probably you want to use the server just as an API, so the views folder is not needed for you.

The view folder is needed when you want to return dynamic content directly from the server.

An example can be, you want to return a page containing a list of something. Then in your controller you make a query, pass the result to the view, the HTML gets compiled and returned.

If you know PHP is what you normally do in a PHP app.

But with nodejs it is easier to just make APIs and then make a client side app with angular or React (which I prefer)