IoC Container for Typescript - 3.X

This is a lightweight annotation-based dependency injection container for typescript.

It can be used on browser, on react native or on node.js server code.

The documentation for the previous version can be found here

Table of Contents

• IoC Container for Typescript
  • Installation
  • Configuration
  • Basic Usage
  • Scopes
    • Singleton Scope
    • Request Scope
    • Local Scope
    • Custom Scopes
  • @Factory
  • @OnlyInstantiableByContainer
  • The Container Class
    • @InjectValue decorator and Constants
    • Namespaces (Environments)
    • Creating temporary configurations
    • Importing configurations from external file
  • A note about classes and interfaces
  • Examples
    • Using Container for testing
    • Using Namespaces
  • Browser usage
  • Restrictions
  • Migrating from previous version

Installation

This library only works with typescript. Ensure it is installed:

npm install typescript -g

To install typescript-ioc:

npm install typescript-ioc

Configuration

Typescript-ioc requires the following TypeScript compilation options in your tsconfig.json file:

{
  "compilerOptions": {
    "experimentalDecorators": true,
    "emitDecoratorMetadata": true,
    "target": "es6" // or anything newer like esnext
  }
}

Basic Usage

import { Inject } from 'typescript-ioc';

class PersonDAO {
    @Inject
    restProxy: PersonRestProxy;
}

That's it. You can just call now:

let personDAO: PersonDAO = new PersonDAO();

And the dependencies will be resolved.

You can also inject constructor parameters, like:

class PersonService {
    private personDAO: PersonDAO;
    constructor(@Inject personDAO: PersonDAO) {
        this.personDAO = personDAO;
    }
}

and then, if you make an injection to this class, like...

class PersonController {
    @Inject
    private personService: PersonService;
}

The container will create an instance of PersonService that receives the PersonDAO from the container on its constructor. But you can still call:

let personService: PersonService = new PersonService(myPersonDAO);

And pass your own instance of PersonDAO to PersonService.

Note that any type with a constructor can be injected.

class PersonController {
    @Inject
    private personService: PersonService;

    @Inject
    creationTime: Date;
}

Inheritance

You don't have to do anything special to work with sub-types.

abstract class BaseDAO {
    @Inject
    creationTime: Date;
}

class PersonDAO extends BaseDAO {
    @Inject
    private personRestProxy: PersonRestProxy;
}

class ProgrammerDAO extends PersonDAO {
    @Inject
    private programmerRestProxy: PersonRestProxy;
}

The above example will work as expected.

Scopes

You can use scopes to manage your instances. We have three pre defined scopes (Scope.Singleton, Scope.Request and Scope.Local), but you can define your own custom Scope.

@Singleton

Allow just one instance for each type bound to this scope.

@Singleton
class PersonService {
    @Inject
    private personDAO: PersonDAO;
}

class PersonController {
    @Inject
    private personService: PersonService;

    @Inject
    creationTime: Date;
}

So, we can create a lot of PersonController instances, but all of them will share the same singleton instance of PersonService

let controller1: PersonController = new PersonController();
let controller2: PersonController = new PersonController();

@InRequestScope

Types bound to this scope will share instances between the same build context. When you call Container.get, a new build context is created and every container resolution performed will share this context.

For example:

@InRequestScope
class RequestScopeClass {}

class FirstClass {
    @Inject
    public a: RequestScopeClass;
}

class SecondClass {
    @Inject
    public a: RequestScopeClass;
    @Inject
    public b: FirstClass;
}

In that example, we can expect:

const secondClass = Container.get(SecondClass);
expect(secondClass.a).toEqual(secondClass.b.a);

Local Scope

The container will create a new instance every time it will be asked to retrieve objects for types bound to the Local scope.

The Local scope is the default scope. So you don't need to configure nothing to work with a Local scope. However if you have a Type bound to other scope and want to change it to the Local scope, you can use the Scope.Local property:

@Singleton
class MyType {}

Container.bind(MyType).scope(Scope.Local);

Custom Scopes

To define a new scope, you just have to extend the Scope abstract class:

class MyScope extends Scope {
    resolve(factory: ObjectFactory, source: Function, context: BuildContext) {
        console.log('created by my custom scope.');
        return factory(context);
    }
}
@Scoped(new MyScope())
class PersonService {
    @Inject
    private personDAO: PersonDAO;
}

Factories

Factories can be used to create the instances inside the IoC Container.

const personFactory: ObjectFactory = () => new PersonService();
@Factory(personFactory)
class PersonService {
    @Inject
    private personDAO: PersonDAO;
}

The Factory method will receive the BuildContext as parameter. So, if you need to retrieve another instance from the container to perform the factory instantiation, you can ask it to the BuildContext. For example:

const personFactory: ObjectFactory = (context) => new PersonService(context.resolve(PersonDAO));
@Factory(personFactory)
class PersonService {
    constructor(private personDAO: PersonDAO) {}
}

The @OnlyInstantiableByContainer annotation

The @OnlyInstantiableByContainer annotation transforms the annotated class, changing its constructor. So, it will only be able to create new instances for the decorated class through to the IoC Container.

It is usefull, for example, to avoid direct instantiation of Singletons.

@Singleton
@OnlyInstantiableByContainer
class PersonService {
    @Inject
    private personDAO: PersonDAO;
}

If anybody try to invoke:

new PersonService();

Will prodeuce a TypeError.

The Container class

You can also bind types directly to Container resolution.

// it will override any annotation configuration
Container.bind(PersonDAO).to(ProgrammerDAO).scope(Scope.Local);

// that will make any injection to Date to return
// the same instance, created when the first call is executed.
Container.bind(Date).to(Date).scope(Scope.Singleton);

// it will ask the IoC Container to retrieve the instance.
let personDAO = Container.get(PersonDAO);

class PersonDAO {
    @Inject
    private personRestProxy: PersonRestProxy;
}

Container.bind(PersonDAO);
let personDAO: PersonDAO = Container.get(PersonDAO);
// or
let otherPersonDAO: PersonDAO = new PersonDAO();
// personDAO.personRestProxy is defined. It was resolved by Container.

@OnlyInstantiableByContainer
@Singleton
class PersonDAO {}

let p: PersonDAO = new PersonDAO(); // throws a TypeError.  classes decorated with @OnlyInstantiableByContainer can not be instantiated directly

const personFactory: ObjectFactory = () => new PersonDAO();
Container.bind(PersonDAO).factory(personFactory); //Works OK

let personDAO = Container.get(PersonDAO); // Works OK

@InjectValue decorator and Constants

It is possible to bind constants to the Container. It is useful for configurations, for example.

interface Config {
    dependencyURL: string;
    port: number;
}

Container.bindName('config').to({
    dependencyURL: 'http://localhost:8080',
    port: 1234
});

And then you can use the @InjectValue decorator exactly as you use @Inject to inject instances.

class MyService {
    constructor(@InjectValue('config') public config: Config) {}
}

It is possible to inject an internal property from a constant, like:

class MyService {
    constructor(
        @InjectValue('config.dependencyURL') private url: string,
        @InjectValue('myConfig.otherProperty.item[0].otherURL')
        private otherURL: string
    ) {}
}

And also to mix constants and other container injections, like:

class MyService {
    constructor(
        @InjectValue('config.dependencyURL') private url: string,
        @InjectValue('myConfig.otherProperty.item[0].otherURL')
        private otherURL: string,
        @Inject private myRepository: MyRepository
    ) {}
}

Value Injections can be used direclty in class properties:

class MyService {
    @InjectValue('config.dependencyURL')
    private url: string;

    @InjectValue('myConfig.otherProperty.item[0].otherURL')
    private otherURL: string;

    @Inject
    private myRepository: MyRepository;
}

Or read directly from the Container:

const url: string = Container.getValue('config.dependencyURL');

It is possible to bind an internal property of a constant, like:

Container.bindName('config.dependencyURL').to('http://anewURL.com');

Namespaces (Environments)

It is possible to create specific namespaces with custom configurations and then tell container to use these namespaces.

For example:

Container.bindName('config.dependencyURL').to('http://myURL.com');
const namespace = Container.namespace('test');
Container.bindName('config.dependencyURL').to('http://anewURL.com');

Only if the namespace 'test' is active, the 'config.dependencyURL' will resolve to 'http://anewURL.com'.

To use the default namespace, just call Container.namespace(null).

If you want to remove a namespace, just call namespace.remove()

const namespace = Container.namespace('test');
namespace.remove();

It is not possible to remove the default namespace.

An alias called 'environment' is defined for the namespace method:

Container.namespace('test');
Container.environment('test'); // both commands are equivalents

Take a look at here for more examples of namespaces usage.

Creating temporary configurations

You can use snapshot for testing or where you need to temporarily override a binding.

describe('Test Service with Mocks', () => {
    const snapshot: Snapshot;
    before(function () {
        // Store the IoC configuration
        snapshot = Container.snapshot();

        // Change the IoC configuration to a mock service.
        Container.bind(IService).to(MockService);
    });

    after(function () {
        // Put the IoC configuration back for IService, so other tests can run.
        snapshot.restore();
    });

    it('Should do a test', () => {
        // Do some test
    });
});

Importing configurations from external file

You can put all manual container configurations in an external file and then use the '''Container.configure''' method to import them.

For example, you can create the ioc.config.ts file:

import { MyType, MyTypeImpl, MyType2, MyType2Factory } from './my-types';
import { Scope } from 'typescript-ioc';
import * as yaml from 'js-yaml';
import * as fs from 'fs';

const config = yaml.safeLoad(fs.readFileSync('service-config.yml', 'utf8'));

export default [
    { bind: MyType, to: MyTypeImpl },
    {
        bind: MyType2,
        factory: MyType2Factory,
        withParams: [Date],
        scope: Scope.Singleton
    },
    { bindName: 'config', to: config }
];

And then import the configurations using:

import { Container } from 'typescript-ioc';
import config from './ioc.config';

Container.configure(config);

You need to load the configurations only once, but before you try to use the objects that depends on these files.

You can create configurations for specific namespaces, like:

import { MyRepository, MyTestRepository } from './my-types';
import * as yaml from 'js-yaml';
import * as fs from 'fs';

const config = yaml.safeLoad(fs.readFileSync('service.config.yml', 'utf8'));
const configTest = yaml.safeLoad(fs.readFileSync('service.config-test.yml', 'utf8'));
const configProd = yaml.safeLoad(fs.readFileSync('service.config-prod.yml', 'utf8'));

export default [
    { bindName: 'config', to: config },
    {
        namespace: {
            test: [
                { bindName: 'config', to: configTest },
                { bind: MyRepository, to: MyTestRepository }
            ],
            production: [{ bindName: 'config', to: configProd }]
        }
    }
];

A note about classes and interfaces

Typescript interfaces only exist at development time, to ensure type checking. When compiled, they do not generate runtime code. This ensures good performance, but also means that is not possible to use interfaces as the type of a property being injected. There is no runtime information that could allow any reflection on interface type. Take a look at https://github.com/Microsoft/TypeScript/issues/3628 for more information about this.

So, this is not supported:

interface PersonDAO {
    get(id: string): Person;
}

class ProgrammerDAO implements PersonDAO {
    @Inject
    private programmerRestProxy: PersonRestProxy;

    get(id: string): Person {
        // get the person and return it...
    }
}

Container.bind(PersonDAO).to(ProgrammerDAO); // NOT SUPPORTED

class PersonService {
    @Inject // NOT SUPPORTED
    private personDAO: PersonDAO;
}

However there is no reason for panic. Typescript classes are much more than classes. It could have the same behavior that interfaces on other languages.

So it is possible to define an abstract class and then implement it as we do with interfaces:

abstract class PersonDAO {
    abstract get(id: string): Person;
}

class ProgrammerDAO implements PersonDAO {
    @Inject
    private programmerRestProxy: PersonRestProxy;

    get(id: string): Person {
        // get the person and return it...
    }
}

Container.bind(PersonDAO).to(ProgrammerDAO); // It works

class PersonService {
    @Inject // It works
    private personDAO: PersonDAO;
}

The abstract class in this example has exactly the same semantic that the typescript interface on the previous example. The only difference is that it generates type information into the runtime code, making possible to implement some reflection on it.

Examples

Using Container for testing

Some examples of using the container for tests:

describe('My Test', () => {
    let myService: MyService;
    beforeAll(() => {
        class MockRepository implements AuthenticationRepository {
            async getAccessToken() {
                return 'my test token';
            }
        }
        Container.bind(AuthenticationRepository).to(MockRepository);
        myService = Container.get(MyService);
    });
    //...
});

or you can configure all your mocks togheter in a mocks.config.ts

class MockRepository implements AuthenticationRepository {
    async getAccessToken() {
        return 'my test token';
    }
}

class OtherMockRepository implements OtherRepository {
    async doSomething() {
        return 'done';
    }
}

export default [
    { bind: AuthenticationRepository, to: MockRepository },
    { bind: OtherRepository, to: OtherMockRepository }
];

and then in your test files:

import mocksConfig from './mocks.config.ts';

describe('My Test', () => {
    let myService: MyService;
    beforeAll(() => {
        Container.config(mocksConfig);
        myService = Container.get(MyService);
    });
    //...
});

or if you want to use the configurations and restore the container after the test:

import mocksConfig from './mocks.config.ts';

describe('My Test', () => {
    let myService: MyService;
    let snaphot: Snaphot;
    beforeAll(() => {
        snapshot = Container.snapshot();
        Container.config(mocksConfig);
        myService = Container.get(MyService);
    });

    afterAll(() => {
        snapshot.restore();
    });

    //...
});

Using Namespaces

Define configurations on a file, like ioc.config.ts:

import { MyRepository, MyTestRepository } from './my-types';
import * as yaml from 'js-yaml';
import * as fs from 'fs';

const config = yaml.safeLoad(fs.readFileSync('service.config.yml', 'utf8'));
const configTest = yaml.safeLoad(fs.readFileSync('service.config-test.yml', 'utf8'));
const configProd = yaml.safeLoad(fs.readFileSync('service.config-prod.yml', 'utf8'));

export default [
    { bindName: 'config', to: config },
    {
        env: {
            test: [
                { bindName: 'config', to: configTest },
                { bind: MyRepository, to: MyTestRepository }
            ],
            production: [{ bindName: 'config', to: configProd }]
        }
    }
];

And then import the configurations using:

import { Container } from 'typescript-ioc';
import config from './ioc.config';

Container.configure(config);
// Then activate the environment calling the container
Container.environment(process.env.NODE_ENV);

Browser usage

It was tested with browserify and webpack, but it should work with any other similar tool.

Starting from version 2, this library only works in browsers that supports javascript ES6 '''class'''. If you need to support old ES5 browsers, please use the version 1.2.6 of this library

Restrictions

• Circular injections are not supported

Migrating from previous version

Some breaking changes:

ES6 suport

This library does not support old ES5 code anymore. So, you need to change the target compilation of your code to es6 (or anything else newer, like es2016, es2020, esnext etc)

Your tsconfig.json needs to include at least:

{
    "compilerOptions": {
        "experimentalDecorators": true,
        "emitDecoratorMetadata": true,
        "target": "es6"
    }
}

This decision was taken to help to solve a lot of bugs with react native and browser environments.

If you need to support es5 code, you can keep using the 1.2.6 version

@AutoWired renamed

A lot of confusion with @AutoWired motivated us to rename it to @OnlyInstantiableByContainer. It is a big name, but it says exactly what that decorator does. It is completely optional (The container will always work in the same way when instrumenting the types), but it transforms the decorated constructor to avoid that anybody create new instances calling direct a new expression.

So you need to change all references to @AutoWired to @OnlyInstantiableByContainer.

@Provided @Provides and Provider interface removed

We changed the name of the interface Provider to ObjectFactory and also change the definition of this type to be a simple function signature.

So, now we have:

// previous version
const provider = {
    get: () => new MyType()
};

// new version
const factory = () => new MyType();

Following the same design, whe renamed the @Provideddecorator to @Factory.

// previous version
@Provided({
    get: () => new MyType()
})
class MyType {}

// new version
@Factory(() => new MyType())
class MyType {}

The @Provides decorator was removed because it could cause a lot of problems, once it was used in the class that would provide an implementation, that usually was always defined in different files. That forced us to had things like ContainerConfig.addSource() to scan folders for files. It caused problems in react native, in browser and in some environments like lambda functions.

We redesigned a new way to load container configurations that does not need to scan folders anymore, removing the problems and improving the performance. Take a look at Container.configure method for a better option for the old @Provides.

Container.snapshot refactored

We had a minor change in the Snapshot handling. We don't have anymore the public method Container.restore(type). A safer way to work with snapshots was implemented. Now the Container.snapshot method returns a snapshot object. That object has a restore() method.

The new way:

const snapshot = Container.snapshot();
snapshot.restore();