Structured response for Node.js application
npm install custom-responsecustom-response module, it returns a constructor that is used to create
var CustomResponse = require('custom-response');
Once you have constructor, you can create a new instance/object from it and set the values
var CustomResponse = require('custom-response');
var cRes = new CustomResponse();
cRes.setResult({})
Structure
An instance of have 2 top level keys and certain access methods, which are used to access to modify
the values stored in cRes
// structure of an instance of
// {
// httpStatus : ;
// body : {
// exception: true,
// result: {},
// msgs: []
// }
// }
#### Properties: 1. httpStatus Contains the http status code for the request. Default value is 500.
For example, if it was fulfilled correctly the value should be 200.
If there was a server side error, it could be 500 and so on. This field is used to set
the status code for
2. body The actual result and meta information about the response.
1. exception Should be boolean. It represents the status
of the response. Its value should be FALSE, in-case is 200.
There are cases where, httpStatus can be 200 but still exception can be TRUE.
For example, user tried to modify some data, but did not specify a mandatory field,
in this case, httpStatus can be 200, but exception will TRUE, since the operation
was not successful.
2. result The actual result for the request. It can be of any type,
an array, an object, an array of objects, Number, string etc.
3. msgs Additional messages in the response. For example, while updating profile, user leaves contact detail
empty but its required, in this case, we can add a message to msgs.
#### Methods:
* setStatus(status) - set http status code
* getStatus() - get http status code from object
* addMessage(msg) - add message to existing array
* setMessages(messages) - override the msgs property and set messages as its value
* getMessages() - return value of msgs property
* setResult(data) - set data as value for result property
* getBody() - return the value of body property
* setException(status) - set exception flag for response
* getException() - return the value of exception flag for response
Example
Consider the case of user signup/registering to your application. For this
example lets consider, that the required fields are:
* Name
* Email
* Password
Following cases will be covered:
1. User did not provide email
2. User provided an email, which already registered in your application
3. The password is too weak
#### Route handling
`
var signupController = require('')
app.get("/signup",signupController.form)
app.post("/signup",signupController.create)
#### Signup form( Jade template )
`
html
head
title Sample for custom-response
body
form(method="post")
div
label Your name
input(type="text",name="name",value=result.name)
div
label Email
input(type="email",name="email",value=result.email)
div
label Password
input(type="password",name="password",value=result.password)
div
input(type="submit",value="Submit")
#### Controller
var services = require("")exports.form = function(req,res){
function callback(data){
res.status(data.getStatus()).render('signupForm',data.getBody())
}
services.form(req,callback)
}
exports.create = function(req,res){
function callback(data){
// if there was an exception, render the signup form again
if ( data.getException() ){
res.status(data.getStatus()).render('signupForm',data.getBody())
} else {
// write code to setup session or this can be done in service method also
// redirect user to home page
res.redirect('/')
}
}
services.create(req,callback)
}
#### Service (file with business logic)
var CustomResponse = require('custom-response')exports.form = function(req,callback){
var cRes = new CustomResponse();
cRes.setException(false);
cRes.setStatus(200);
callback(cRes)
}
exports.create = function(req,callback){
var cRes = new CustomResponse();
// since its a post request data will be accessed from
var body = req.body,
name = body.name,
email = body.email,
password = body.password;
// exception is set to false initially
// if any validation check fails, it'll again be set true
cRes.setException(false); // name not specified or kept empty
if ( !name ) {
cRes.addMessage('Name is required')
cRes.setException(true);
}
// email not specified or kept empty
if ( !email ) {
cRes.addMessage('Email is required')
cRes.setException(true);
}
// password not specified or too weak
if ( _isWeak(password) ) {
cRes.addMessage('Your password is weak. Try a longer password, with special symbols')
cRes.setException(true);
}
if (cRes.getException() === true) {
// set
as result, this will be used to repopulate the signup form
cRes.setResult(body)
} else {
// create user
}
// by default status is 500, hence you should set its value before you pass it to callback
cRes.setStatus(200);
callback(cRes)
}function _isWeak(password){
// code to check password strength
}
``