MongoDB on VPS with mongoose not inserting - node.js

Question

I created a simple demo using mongoose, which works perfectly on localhost:
mongoose.connect('mongodb://localhost/mindmap', function(err, next) {
if(err) return next(err);
console.log('database connected');
});
It fetches data with a simple find:
/* GET mindmaps. */
router.get('/', function(req, res, next) {
Mindmap.find(function (err, mindmaps) {
if (err) return next(err);
res.json(mindmaps);
});
});
And adds data through socket connection
// handle adding new mindmaps
socket.on('mindmap.add', function (data) {
Mindmap.create(data, function (err, mindmap) {
if (err) throw err;
mindmaps.push(mindmap);
io.sockets.emit('mindmap.add', mindmap);
});
});
Now all of this is working fine locally.
Today I installed npm, bower, the app itself and MongoDB on my CentOS 6.5 VPS. I started the mongo service and on the server changed app.js to connect to the correct ip/port:
mongoose.connect('mongodb://127.0.0.1:27017/mindmap', function(err, next) {
When I start the app with node bin/www the connect does not throw any errors and simply states that the database is connected. The /mindmap gives an empty array (which is logical at this point). Adding a new mindmap through the socket connection even emits a proper mindmap object and the html will display it. There's no errors, but also nothing is saved and on a refresh it starts empty again. Also in the mongo shell there's nothing in the collection.. and if I add something manually I can't see it in /mindmap.
Full client-side code is on http://mindmap.solidwebcode.com:3000/mindmap
For reference this is the model:
var mongoose = require('mongoose');
var SubjectSchema = new mongoose.Schema({
title: String,
x: Number,
y: Number,
w: Number,
h: Number,
parent: mongoose.Schema.Types.ObjectId
});
var MindmapSchema = new mongoose.Schema({
name: String,
theme: String,
subjects: [SubjectSchema],
created_at: { type: Date, default: Date.now },
updated_at: { type: Date, default: Date.now }
});
module.exports = mongoose.model('Mindmap', MindmapSchema);
I installed mongodb using:
sudo yum --enablerepo=epel install mongodb mongodb-server
sudo service mongod start
Also starting mongo works as expected, although there's some warnings:
Server has startup warnings:
2015-05-04T13:42:08.955+0200 [initandlisten]
2015-05-04T13:42:08.955+0200 [initandlisten] ** WARNING: You are running in OpenVZ which can cause issues on versions of RHEL older than RHEL6.
2015-05-04T13:42:08.955+0200 [initandlisten]
I have never before installed mongo on a VPS and used it. Am I missing something trivial?

Answer 1

The problem is not MongoDB is not working, but rather that the socket connection was started to localhost:3000, which is not the same as the external server.. so while nothing happends on the remote server, the local server was accepting the socket connection and adding new records in it's own database.
Solution was simple: change the socket connect to a remote address.