# @lifeomic/alpha > Unified client for HTTP services. Latest version **7.1.0** (published 2026-06-05) · MIT license · 0 weekly downloads ## Install ```sh npm install @lifeomic/alpha pnpm add @lifeomic/alpha yarn add @lifeomic/alpha bun add @lifeomic/alpha ``` ## Health **Score 60/100 (C)** — status: active. Positive: has types; no vulnerabilities; high maintenance score; high quality score. Warnings: low downloads; no esm support. ## Facts | | | |---|---| | Version | 7.1.0 | | Published | 2026-06-05 | | First published | 2017-09-15 | | Weekly downloads | 0 | | License | MIT | | TypeScript types | bundled | | Module format | CommonJS | | Node | >=14 | | Dependencies | 14 | | Unpacked size | 150.3 KB | | Known vulnerabilities | 0 (+1 in 1 direct dependencies) | | Install scripts | no | | GitHub stars | 19 | | Author | LifeOmic | | Maintainers | lifeomicdev, npm-lifeomicdev-github, joshmyers, hallsamuel90 | ## Links - npm: https://www.npmjs.com/package/@lifeomic/alpha - Repository: https://github.com/lifeomic/alpha - Homepage: https://github.com/lifeomic/alpha#readme - Issues: https://github.com/lifeomic/alpha/issues - npm.io page: https://npm.io/package/@lifeomic/alpha ## Dependencies (14) - [uuid](https://npm.io/package/uuid.md) ^8.3.2 - [axios](https://npm.io/package/axios.md) ^1.6.0 - [lodash](https://npm.io/package/lodash.md) ^4.17.21 - [nearley](https://npm.io/package/nearley.md) 2 - [url-parse](https://npm.io/package/url-parse.md) ^1.5.10 - [@types/aws-lambda](https://npm.io/package/@types/aws-lambda.md) ^8.10.101 - [aws-xray-sdk-core](https://npm.io/package/aws-xray-sdk-core.md) ^3.12.0 - [@aws-sdk/url-parser](https://npm.io/package/@aws-sdk/url-parser.md) ^3.357.0 - [@aws-sdk/signature-v4](https://npm.io/package/@aws-sdk/signature-v4.md) ^3.110.0 - [@aws-sdk/client-lambda](https://npm.io/package/@aws-sdk/client-lambda.md) ^3.118.1 - [@aws-sdk/abort-controller](https://npm.io/package/@aws-sdk/abort-controller.md) ^3.110.0 - [@aws-crypto/sha256-browser](https://npm.io/package/@aws-crypto/sha256-browser.md) ^2.0.1 - [@aws-sdk/node-http-handler](https://npm.io/package/@aws-sdk/node-http-handler.md) ^3.118.1 - [@aws-sdk/credential-provider-node](https://npm.io/package/@aws-sdk/credential-provider-node.md) ^3.121.0 ## Recent versions - 7.1.0 (latest) — 2026-06-05 - 5.3.0-alpha.1 (alpha) — 2024-02-26 - 2.0.2-pr-120-1773212537-1643641031.0 (pr-120) — 2022-01-31 - 2.0.3-pr-119-1764237666-1643415301.0 (pr-119) — 2022-01-29 - 2.0.2-pr-117-1763461396-1643401195.0 (pr-117) — 2022-01-28 - 2.0.1-pr-116-1698933465-1642183132.0 (pr-116) — 2022-01-14 - 2.0.1-pr-115-1698560824-1642176971.0 (pr-115) — 2022-01-14 - 2.0.1-pr-114-1698529647-1642176516.0 (pr-114) — 2022-01-14 - 2.0.1-pr-112-1608559743-1640118807.0 (pr-112) — 2021-12-21 - 2.0.1-pr-111-1295985448-1633109026.0 (pr-111) — 2021-10-01 - 1.5.1-pr-110-1291898890-1633019882.0 (pr-110) — 2021-09-30 - 1.4.3-pr-102-1095417579-1628090088.0 (pr-102) — 2021-08-04 - 1.4.3-pr-99-936267128-1623683896.0 (pr-99) — 2021-06-14 - 1.4.3-pr-96-860317229-1621512531.0 (pr-96) — 2021-05-20 - 1.4.2-pr-95-854045840-1621356344.0 (pr-95) — 2021-05-18 - … 80 more at https://npm.io/package/@lifeomic/alpha/versions ## README # alpha [![License](https://img.shields.io/badge/license-MIT-blue.svg)](https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT) [![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/lifeomic/alpha.svg?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/lifeomic/alpha) [![Coverage Status](https://coveralls.io/repos/github/lifeomic/alpha/badge.svg?branch=master)](https://coveralls.io/github/lifeomic/alpha?branch=master) [![Greenkeeper badge](https://badges.greenkeeper.io/lifeomic/alpha.svg)](https://greenkeeper.io/) [![Known Vulnerabilities](https://snyk.io/test/github/lifeomic/alpha/badge.svg?targetFile=package.json)](https://snyk.io/test/github/lifeomic/alpha?targetFile=package.json) [![PRs Welcome](https://img.shields.io/badge/PRs-welcome-brightgreen.svg)](https://github.com/lifeomic/alpha) Alpha is a module that provides a single client interface for interacting with HTTP micro-services regardless of whether they are implemented as Lambda functions or real HTTP servers. ## API `Alpha` instances are [`axios`][axios] clients at their core. This means that they support the full `axios` API. The difference is how `Alpha` instances are instantiated. Regardless of how an `Alpha` instance is instantiated, requests to fully qualified HTTP URLs will _always_ perform a real HTTP request. Requests made to Lambda functions with a `Buffer` payload will automatically encode the request body using the base64 encoding. ### `new Alpha(target)` Creates a new `Alpha` instances. All `Alpha` instances support the full [`axios`][axios] API. #### HTTP Targets When an `Alpha` instance is created with an HTTP(S) base URL target, requests to unqualified URLs will be relative to the base URL. For example, the following code will dispatch the request to `http://example.com/some/path`. ```javascript const alpha = new Alpha('http://example.com'); const response = await alpha.get('/some/path'); ``` #### Lambda Function Targets When an `Alpha` instance is created with a base URL using the `lambda` scheme, requests to unqualified URLs will cause the specified [Lambda function][lambda] to be invoked with a synthetic [API Gateway][api-gateway] event using the optional [Lambda alias][lambda-alias]. For example, the following code will invoke the `test-function` Lambda function with the `named-alias`. ```javascript const alpha = new Alpha('lambda://test-function:named-alias'); const response = await alpha.get('/some/path'); ``` The `lambda` URL scheme is interpreted according to the following pattern: ```xml lambda://: ``` #### Lambda Handler Targets When an `Alpha` instance is created with a handler function target, requests to unqualified URLs will be transformed into synthetic [API Gateway (v1)][api-gateway] events that will be passed directly to the handler function. This is primarily used for unit testing Lambda handlers. ```javascript const alpha = new Alpha(handlerFunction); const response = await alpha.get('/some/path'); ``` ### Request Retries An `Alpha` client can be configured to retry a failed attempt. A retryable failure currently means a request that failed from a network error or had a `5xx` status code. ```javascript // Retry failed requests using default settings const alpha = new Alpha('http://example.com', { retry: true }); ``` ```javascript // Retry failed requests using custom settings const alpha = new Alpha('http://example.com', { retry: { attempts: 3, // The number of attempts to make (default 3) factor: 2, // The factor to use for the exponential backoff delay (default 2) maxTimeout: 10000, // The max timeout in milliseconds to delay before the next attempt (default 10000) retryCondition: function (error) { } // If function result is truthy, the error will be retried (default is retry network and 5xx errors) }); ``` #### Mocking Lambda To redirect the Lambda requests to a mocked implementation, either set the `LAMBDA_ENDPOINT` environment variable, or use the `lambdaEndpoint` config option: ```javascript const alpha = new Alpha('lambda:my-lambda', { lambdaEndpoint: 'http://localstack:4566' }); ``` The value of this option will be used when creating the AWS Lambda client. ### `Alpha.dockerLambda(options, clientOptions)` Creates an `Alpha` client instance that dispatches requests to [`docker-lambda`][docker-lambda]. This facilitates testing Lambda services in a full mock Lambda environment running in a docker container. The `options` are passed to the [`docker-lambda`][docker-lambda] library and the `clientOptions` configure the `Alpha` client instance that is created. [api-gateway]: https://aws.amazon.com/documentation/apigateway/ "AWS API Gateway" [axios]: https://github.com/mzabriskie/axios "Axios" [docker-lambda]: https://github.com/lambci/docker-lambda "docker-lambda" [lambda]: https://aws.amazon.com/documentation/lambda/ "AWS Lambda" [lambda-alias]: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/lambda/latest/dg/versioning-aliases.html "AWS Lambda Versioning / Aliases" --- _Source: https://npm.io/package/@lifeomic/alpha · Machine-readable twin of the npm.io package page. Health data is recomputed on every publish._