fallback

retry a function with a series of arguments until one works

usage

// run this in the repo: npm install; node sample.js
// test a list of servers for a response
var fallback = require('fallback')
var request = require('request')

var servers = ['http://foo.baz', 'http://google.com', 'http://fail']

fallback(servers, function (server, callback) {
console.log('trying server at ' + server)
request(server, function (err, response) {
if (err || response.statusCode >= 400) {
// try the next server
return callback()
}
callback(null, response.statusCode)
})
}, function (err, result, server) {
if (err) {
console.error(err)
process.exit(1)
}
if (result) {
console.log('server ' + server + ' returned: ' + result)
} else {
console.log('no servers returned successfully')
}
})

returns

trying server at http://foo.baz
trying server at http://google.com
server http://google.com returned: 200

API

fallback: (array: Array, iteratorFunction: IteratorFunction, outerCallback: OuterCallback) => void

Call fallback with an array of alternative values to be used as arguments on
iteratorFunction.

IteratorFunction: (arrayItem, callback: (err: Error, result) => void) => void

iteratorFunction is an async function of
function (arrayItem, callback), where callback is a normal node-style
callback(err, result) continuation. Note that if an error is given to
callback, the entire fallback sequence will terminate early. This should be
used for unrecoverable errors. To indicate that the operation on the current
arrayItem did not succeed and that the next one should be tried, callback
should be invoked with a null error and an undefined or false value for
result. A result value of null has the semantics that "the operation
succeeded (and therefore further fallbacks should not be tried), and there
was no result value".

OuterCallback: (err: Error, result, arrayItem, array: Array) => void

In outerCallback, there are three possible return states:
err is not undefined: there was an unrecoverable error when executing the
fallback sequence.
result is false: none of the fallback alternatives were successful.
arrayItem is null, and array contains the original array.
result is not false: one of the fallback alternatives was successful.
result contains the result value of that operation and arrayItem
contains the value that was used in the successful operation. array
contains the original array.

The parameters for outerCallback are similar to those in the callback for
Array.prototype.map - first the value, then an index, then the original
collection.

isn't this the same as async.some?

Sort of, but fallback has much better semantics, and it uses normal
node-style async callbacks (eg, callback(err, result) ) for composability.

installation

with npm

$ npm install fallback

contributors

- jden
- Nathan Peck

license

MIT
(c) MMXIII jden - Jason Denizac
http://jden.mit-license.org/2012