ng2-restify

Tiny REST Provider for Angular 2

This is still very basic and experimental. I do not recommend using it in production.

What this provider does

• Set up RESTful providers on the fly
• Set up universal, global and local headers for your requests
• Set up Response Transformers
• GET requests caching

What this provider doesn't do

At the moment, this library supports requests for GET, POST, PUT and DELETE.

Support for JSON, HEAD and PATCH is planned.

How to install it

Just run in your terminal:

npm install ng2-restify --save

Set provider up

Suppose you're setting up the library in your component AppComponent:

@NgModule({
  providers:[UsersProvider,
    {
        provide: RestifyProvider,
        useFactory: (http: Http) => {
            return new RestifyProvider(http);
        },
        deps: [Http]
    }
  ],
  bootstrap: [AppComponent]
})

Example

Create a Provider

The provider needs to extend RestifyProvider. Set it as follows:

// provider
import { Injectable } from '@angular/core';
import { Http } from '@angular/http';
import { Observable } from 'rxjs/Observable';
import { UserTransformer } from './transformers/userTransformer';

import {
    RestifyProvider,
    BaseUrl,
    Get,
    Post,
    Put,
    Delete,
    TransformResponse
} from 'ng2-restify';

@Injectable()
@BaseUrl('http://localhost:3000')
export class UsersProvider extends RestifyProvider {
    constructor(public http: Http) {
        super(http);
    }
    
    @TransformResponse(UserTransformer)
    @Get({path: '/users', cache: true})
    public getUsers(): Observable<any> {
        return;
    }
    
    @Post('/users')
    public createUser(user): Observable<any> {
        return;
    }
    
    @Put('/users/:id')
    public updateUser(user): Observable<any> {
        return;
    }
    
    @Delete('/users/:id')
    public deleteUser(params: {id: number}): Observable<any> {
        return;
    }
}

Create a Component that uses RestifyProvider

export class MyComponent {
    private users: User[] = [];
    private selectedUser: User;

    private model: User = {
        name: <string>undefined,
        surname: <string>undefined
    };

    constructor(private usersProvider: UsersProvider) {}

    public ngOnInit() {
       this.usersProvider
           .getUsers()
           .subscribe(users => this.users = users);
    }

    private createUser() {
        const {name, surname} = this.model;

        this.usersProvider
            .createUser({name, surname}) // (or save, if using @Resource)
            .subscribe(data => {
                this.users.push(data);
            });
    }

    public submit() {
        if (this.selectedUser) {
            this.updateUser();
        } else {
            this.createUser();
        }
    }

    public updateUser() {
        const {name, surname} = this.model;

        this.selectedUser = Object.assign({}, this.selectedUser, {
            name,
            surname
        });

        this.usersProvider
            .updateUser(this.selectedUser)
            .subscribe(user => {
                const index = this.users.findIndex(user => this.selectedUser.id === user.id);
                this.users[index] = user;
            });
    }

    public deleteUser(id: number) {
        this.usersProvider
            .deleteUser({id})
            .subscribe(user => {
                const index = this.users.findIndex(user => this.selectedUser.id === user.id);
                this.users.splice(index, 1);
            });
    }

    public selectUser(user: User) {
        this.selectedUser = user;
        this.model = Object.assign({}, user);
    }
}

Resource and Action

Let's rewrite the same example using @Resource (and @Action, optionally). This is our UsersProvider rewritten in a few lines of code:

//...imports...

@Injectable()
@BaseUrl('http://localhost:3000')
@Resource('/users/(:id)')
export class UsersProvider extends RestifyProvider {
    constructor(public http: Http) {
        super(http);
    }

    @Get()
    @Action('/profile')
    public getProfile(): Observable<any> {
        return;
    }
}

This is the body of our component. As you can, I replaced createUser with save, deleteUser with delete, updateUser with update and finally getUser with get.

Indeed, if you specify the @Resource path (and eventual optional path segments), the provider is populated with these 4 methods built in, which is easy and quick for non-complex providers.

// imports...
// @Component...

private createUser() {
    const {name, surname} = this.model;

    this.usersProvider
        .save({name, surname})
        .subscribe(data => {
            this.users.push(data);
        });
}

public submit() {
    if (this.selectedUser) {
        this.updateUser();
    } else {
        this.createUser();
    }
}

public updateUser() {
    const {name, surname} = this.model;

    this.selectedUser = Object.assign({}, this.selectedUser, {
        name,
        surname
    });

    this.usersProvider
        .update(this.selectedUser)
        .subscribe(user => {
            const index = this.users.findIndex(user => this.selectedUser.id === user.id);
            this.users[index] = user;
        });
}

public deleteUser(id: number) {
    this.usersProvider
        .delete({id})
        .subscribe(user => {
            const index = this.users.findIndex(user => this.selectedUser.id === user.id);
            this.users.splice(index, 1);
        });
}

Further Options

Headers

Universal Headers

Universal Headers are valid for all requests done via RestifyProvider. You will need to import the RestifyProvider and set up the headers with configurator.setUniversalHeaders.

@Component({
  selector   : 'app',
  templateUrl: './app.html',
})
export class AppComponent {
    constructor(private restify: RestifyProvider) {
        restify.configurator.setUniversalHeaders([{
            'Authorization': 'Basic 123'
        }]);
    }
}

Global Headers

Global Headers are valid for all the methods in the provider they're used with

import {
    RestifyProvider,
    GlobalHeaders
} from 'ng2-restify';

@Injectable()
@BaseUrl('http://localhost:3000')
@GlobalHeaders({
    'Content-Type': 'application/json',
    'Authorization': 'Basic YnBjxDpib43q'
})
export class UsersProvider extends RestifyProvider {
    constructor(public http: Http) {
        super(http);
    }
}

Local Headers

Local Headers are only valid for the method they're used with

import {
    RestifyProvider,
    Get,
    LocalHeaders
} from 'ng2-restify';

@Injectable()
@BaseUrl('http://localhost:3000')
export class UsersProvider extends RestifyProvider {
    constructor(public http: Http) {
        super(http);
    }
    
    @LocalHeaders({
        'Content-Type': 'application/text'
    })
    @Get('/users')
    public getUsers(): Observable<Users> { return; }
}  

Retry

Set the number of times a request should be retried if throwing an error. By default it is 1.

import {
    RestifyProvider,
    Get,
    Retry
} from 'ng2-restify';

@Injectable()
@BaseUrl('http://localhost:3000')
export class UsersProvider extends RestifyProvider {
    constructor(public http: Http) {
        super(http);
    }
    
    @Retry(3)
    @Get('/users')
    public getUsers(): Observable<Users> { return; }
}  

WithCredentials

Set the withCredentials header in the request.

import {
    RestifyProvider,
    Post,
    WithCredentials
} from 'ng2-restify';

@Injectable()
@BaseUrl('http://localhost:3000')
export class UsersProvider extends RestifyProvider {
    constructor(public http: Http) {
        super(http);
    }
    
    @WithCredentials()
    @Post('/login')
    public login(creds): Observable<Users> { return; }
}  

ResponseType

Set the withCredentials flag in the request.

import {
    RestifyProvider,
    Get,
    ResponseType
} from 'ng2-restify';

@Injectable()
@BaseUrl('http://localhost:3000')
export class UsersProvider extends RestifyProvider {
    constructor(public http: Http) {
        super(http);
    }
    
    @ResponseType('text')
    @Post('/user')
    public createUser(user): Observable<Users> { return; }
}  

Invalidate Cache

When you want to invalidate your cache, just pass the path of a method to the invalidate method of your provider:

private invalidateGetUsers() {
    this.usersProvider.invalidate('/users');
}

Routes Syntax

Under the hood, ng2-restify uses the great library Route Parser. Please have a look at it to know how to define your routes.

TODO:

• Add PATCH, HEAD and JSONP methods
• Define default parameters value for methods
• ... Please open an issue for feature requests/bugs