@overnightjs/core NPM

OvernightJS

:warning: OvernightJS/logger and OvernightJS/jwt are deprecated. For logging please see jet-logger.

TypeScript decorators for the ExpressJS Web Server!

What is it

OvernightJS is a simple library to add TypeScript decorators for methods meant to call Express routes. It also includes a package for managing json-web-tokens and printing logs.

Features

Define a base route using a @Controller decorator.
Decorators to convert class methods to Express routes (@Get, @Put, @Post, @Delete etc).
Method decorators also work with arrow functions set as class properties.
@Middleware and @ClassMiddleware decorators.
@ErrorMiddleware and @ErrorMiddleware decorators to handle request errors.
Add options to controllers the same as you would Express routers with @ClassOptions.
Support for child-controllers with @ChildControllers.
@Wrapper and @ClassWrapper decorators to wrap functions.
Server superclass to initialize ExpressJS server and setup controllers.
Allows for adding your own custom Router classes if you don't want to use the standard express Router.
Easy to configure logging tool.
Json-Web-Token management.
Master repo includes a sample application, if you want to practice with an API calling tool such as Postman.
Compatible with both es5 and es6.
Fully type safe :)

Why OvernightJS

OvernightJS isn't meant to be a replacement for Express. If you're already somewhat familiar with ExpressJS, you can learn Overnight in about 10 minutes. There are some other frameworks which do add decorators for Express such as NestJS and TsExpressDecorators, but these are massive frameworks with entire websites dedicated to their documentation. OvernightJS is clean, simple, and aside from the decorators, you can interact with ExpressJS in the same way you would any other Node application.

Installation

You can get the latest release using npm:

$ npm install --save @overnightjs/core express 
$ npm install --save-dev @types/express

Important! OvernightJS requires Node >= 6, Express >= 4, TypeScript >= 2.0 and the experimentalDecorators, lib compilation options in your tsconfig.json file.

Quick start

Create your controller

import { OK, BAD_REQUEST } from 'http-status-codes';
import { Controller, Middleware, Get, Post, Put, Delete } from '@overnightjs/core';
import { Request, Response } from 'express';
import Logger from 'jet-logger';

@Controller('api/users')
export class UserController {

    @Get(':id')
    private get(req: Request, res: Response) {
        Logger.Info(req.params.id);
        return res.status(OK).json({
            message: 'get_called',
        });
    }

    @Get('')
    @Middleware([middleware1, middleware2])
    private getAll(req: ISecureRequest, res: Response) {
        Logger.Info(req.payload, true);
        return res.status(OK).json({
            message: 'get_all_called',
        });
    }

    @Post()
    private add(req: Request, res: Response) {
        Logger.Info(req.body, true);
        return res.status(OK).json({
            message: 'add_called',
        });
    }

    @Put('update-user')
    private update(req: Request, res: Response) {
        Logger.Info(req.body);
        return res.status(OK).json({
            message: 'update_called',
        });
    }

    @Delete('delete/:id')
    private delete(req: Request, res: Response) {
        Logger.Info(req.params, true);
        return res.status(OK).json({
            message: 'delete_called',
        });
    }

    @Get(/ane/) // Rexes supported. Matches /lane, /cane, etc.
    public getAne(req: Request, res: Response): any {
        return res.status(OK).json({
            message: '/ane/',
        });
    }

    @Get('practice/async')
    private async getWithAsync(req: Request, res: Response) {
        try {
            const asyncMsg = await this.asyncMethod(req);
            return res.status(OK).json({
                message: asyncMsg,
            });
        } catch (err) {
            Logger.Err(err, true);
            return res.status(BAD_REQUEST).json({
                error: err.message,
            });
        }
    }

    private asyncMethod(req: Request): Promise<string> {
        return new Promise((resolve) => {
            resolve(req.originalUrl + ' called');
        });
    }
}

You don't have to use class methods, you can also use class properties whose value is an arrow function. You will have to cast Overnight to the 'any' type to avoid type errors though.

import * as OvernightJS from '@overnightjs/core';

    ...

    @(OvernightJS as any).Get('arrow/:id')
    private get = (req: Request, res: Response) => {
        this.logger.info(req.params.id);
        return res.status(200).json({msg: 'get_arrow_called'});
    }

If you want your middleware to apply to every route in a class use the @ClassMiddleware decorator.

import { Controller, ClassMiddleware } from '@overnightjs/core';

@Controller('api/users')
@ClassMiddleware([middleware1, middleware2])
export class UserController {
    
    ...
}

You can set the @ErrorMiddleware / @ClassErrorMiddleware decorators to use Express error handling.

import { Controller, ErrorMiddleware, ClassErrorMiddleware } from '@overnightjs/core';

@Controller('api/users')
@ClassErrorMiddleware(errorMiddleware1)
export class UserController {
    
	@Get(':id')
	@ErrorMiddleware(errorMiddleware2)
    private get(req: Request, res: Response)
    ...
}

Child-controllers can be added with the @ChildControllers decorator. There's no limit to how many levels of nesting you can add. Make sure to instantiate them before adding them. Options at the class level can be added with @ClassOptions decorator.

import { Controller, ClassOptions, ChildControllers } from '@overnightjs/core';
import { ChildController1, ChildController2 } from '...'

@Controller('api/users')
@ClassOptions({mergeParams: true})
@ChildControllers([
    new ChildController1(), 
    new ChildController2(),
])
export class ParentController {
    
    ...
}

You can wrap each class method in a custom function with the @Wrapper decorator. If you use the @ClassWrapper decorator then every method in that class will be wrapped with the provided method.

import * as expressAsyncHandler from 'express-async-handler';
import { ClassWrapper, Controller, Get, Wrapper } from '@overnightjs/core';
import { Request, Response } from 'express';

@Controller('wrapper-practice')
// Or instead of using @Wrapper below you could use @ClassWrapper here
export class WrapperController {
    
    @Get('async-third-party/:id')
    @Wrapper(expressAsyncHandler)
    private async asyncThirdParty(req: Request, res: Response) {
        const asyncMsg = await someAsyncFunction();
        return res.status(200).json({
            message: asyncMsg,
        });
    }
}

Import your controllers into the server

OvernightJS provides a Server superclass which initializes a new ExpressJS application. The express object is accessed using this.app, which is a protected, readonly class variable. You can interact with this variable like you would any normal express Application created with require('express')(). If you want to print to the console the name of each controller that has been successfully configured, set showLogs to true via the this.showLogs setter or the Server constructor().

super.addControllers() must be called to enable all of the routes in your controller. Make sure to call it after setting up your middleware. You can pass super.addControllers() a single controller-instance or an array of controller-instances, but they must be instantiated first.

import * as bodyParser from 'body-parser';
import { Server } from '@overnightjs/core';
import Logger from 'jet-logger';
import { UserController } from './UserController';
import { SignupController } from './SignupController';

export class SampleServer extends Server {
    
    constructor() {
        super(process.env.NODE_ENV === 'development'); // setting showLogs to true
        this.app.use(bodyParser.json());
        this.app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({extended: true}));
        this.setupControllers();
    }

    private setupControllers(): void {
        const userController = new UserController();
        const signupController = new SignupController();
        const dbConnObj = new SomeDbConnClass('credentials');
        signupController.setDbConn(dbConnObj);
        userController.setDbConn(dbConnObj);
        // super.addControllers() must be called, and can be passed a single controller or an array of 
        // controllers. Optional router object can also be passed as second argument.
        super.addControllers(
            [userController, signupController],
            /*, optional router here*/,
            /* middleware that will apply to all controllers here */,
        );
    }

    public start(port: number): void {
        this.app.listen(port, () => {
            Logger.Imp('Server listening on port: ' + port);
        })
    }
}

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you initialize environment variables from some script which imports the Server script, those environment variables must be configured before importing the Server script or else they could end up undefined for nested controllers.

See how awesome this is!

Without the above decorators we would have to wrap each controller method with something like:

/* In the controller file*/
class UserController {
    
    public getRoutes(): Router {
        const router = Router();
        router.get('/', [your middleware], (req, res) => {
            // Do some stuff in here
        });
        router.get('/anotherRoute', [other middleware], (req, res) => {
            // Do some stuff in here
        });
        // Repeat for every single controller method
        return router;
    }
}

let userController = new UserController();
this.app.use('/api/users', userController.getRoutes());
// Repeat for every single controller class

This would get really tedious overtime and lead to a lot of boiler plate code.

Using a Custom Router

Suppose you don't want to use the built in "Router" object which is provided by Express. Maybe you want use express-promise-router because you don't like using try/catch blocks. OvernightJS allows you to pass in a custom router object in the super.addControllers() method. Simply pass in your custom router as the second param after the controller-instance/s. When you don't specify a custom router, the default express.Router() object is used.

Controller using express-promise-router:

import { Request, Response } from 'express';
import { Controller, Get } from '@overnightjs/core';

@Controller('api/posts')
export class PostController {

    @Get(':id')
    private get(req: Request, res: Response) {
        return this.someAsyncFunction(req.params.id)
                    .then(ret => res.status(200).json({msg: ret}));
    }

    private someAsyncFunction(id: number): Promise<string> {
        return new Promise((res, rej) => {
            isNaN(id) ? rej('Invalid id') : res('Valid id');
        })
    }
}

Add express-promise-router in the super.addControllers() method:

import * as customRouter  from 'express-promise-router';
import { Server } from '@overnightjs/core';
import { PostController } from './controllers/PostController';

export class CustomRouterServer extends Server {
    
    constructor() {
        super();
        super.addControllers(new PostController(), customRouter); // <-- custom router added here
    }

    ...
}