XMLHttpRequest emulation for node.js
npm install xhr2This is an npm package that implements the
W3C XMLHttpRequest specification on top
of the node.js APIs.
This library is tested against the following platforms.
Keep in mind that the versions above are not hard requirements.
The preferred installation method is to add the library to the dependencies
section in your package.json.
``json`
{
"dependencies": {
"xhr2": "*"
}
}
Alternatively, npm can be used to install the library directly.
`bash`
npm install xhr2
Once the library is installed, require-ing it returns the XMLHttpRequest
constructor.
`javascript`
var XMLHttpRequest = require('xhr2');
The other objects that are usually defined in an XHR environment are hanging
off of XMLHttpRequest.
`javascript`
var XMLHttpRequestUpload = XMLHttpRequest.XMLHttpRequestUpload;
MDN (the Mozilla Developer Network) has a
great intro to XMLHttpRequest.
This library's CoffeeDocs can
be used as quick reference to the XMLHttpRequest specification parts that were
implemented.
The following standard features are implemented.
* http and https URI protocolssend()
* Basic authentication according to the XMLHttpRequest specification
* request and response header management
* accepts the following data types: String, ArrayBufferView,responseType
ArrayBuffer (deprecated in the standard)
* values: text, json, arraybufferreadystatechange
* and download progress eventsoverrideMimeType()
* abort()
* timeout
*
* automated redirection following
The following node.js extensions are implemented.
* send() accepts a node.js BufferresponseType
* Setting to buffer produces a node.js BuffernodejsSet
* does XHR network configuration that is not exposed in browsers,
for security reasons
The following standard features are not implemented.
* FormData
* Blob
* file:// URIsdata:
* URIs
* upload progress events
* synchronous operation
* Same-origin policy checks and CORS
* cookie processing
The library aims to implement the
W3C XMLHttpRequest specification, so
the library's API will always be a (hopefully growing) subset of the API in the
specification.
The following commands will get the source tree in a node-xhr2/ directory and
build the library.
`bash`
git clone git://github.com/pwnall/node-xhr2.git
cd node-xhr2
npm install
npm pack
Installing CoffeeScript globally will let you type cake instead ofnode_modules/.bin/cake
`bash`
npm install -g coffeescript
The library comes with unit tests that exercise the XMLHttpRequest API.
`bash`
cake test
The tests themselves can be tested by running them in a browser environment,
where a different XMLHttpRequest implementation is available. Both Google
Chrome and Firefox deviate from the specification in small ways, so it's best
to run the tests in both browsers and mentally compute an intersection of the
failing tests.
`bash``
cake webtest
BROWSER=firefox cake webtest
The library is Copyright (c) 2013 Victor Costan, and distributed under the MIT
License.