koa-wormhole

A simple, predictable, low-performance router for Koa similar to koa-router and Express 4's built-in router.

npm install --save koa-wormhole

Quickstart

const Router = require('koa-wormhole');
const app = require('koa')();
 
const router1 = new Router();
router1.use(function*(next) { console.log('inside router1'); yield* next; });
router1.get('/', ...);
 
const router2 = new Router();
router2.get('/users', ...);
router2.post('/users', ...);
router2.get('/users/:username', ...);
 
app.use(router1.middleware());
app.use(router2.middleware());
app.listen(3000, () => console.log('listening on 3000'));

Router middleware (middleware mounted via router.use(...)) are only run if the request matches any of the router's routes. Else, the router is skipped.

Usage

You can find a lot of examples in koa-wormhole's tests: https://github.com/danneu/koa-wormhole/blob/master/test/index.js

Basics

Just like a koa instance, a router instance has router.use(...middleware) that takes one or more middleware generator functions.

const mw1 = function*(next) {
  console.log('executing mw1');
  yield* next;
};
 
const mw2 = function*(next) {
  console.log('executing mw2');
  yield* next;
};
 
router.use(mw1, mw2);
 
app.use(router.middleware());

However, a router's top-level middleware will not run unless the request matches one of the router's routes.

Let's define a route for the above example.

router.use(mw1, mw2);
 
router.get('/test', function*() {
  console.log('executing GET /test');
  this.body = 'hello world';
});
 
app.use(router.middleware());

Since the two middleware were mounted before the route, they will run before the route:

$ curl http://localhost:3000/test
// executing mw1
// executing mw2
// executing GET /foo
//=> 'hello world'

And, unlike in koa-router, mount order matters in koa-wormhole.

If we mount the route before the middleware, then the middleware will not get to execute unless the route yield* next.

This is just predictable middleware behavior.

router.get('/test', function*() {
  console.log('executing GET /test');
  this.body = 'hello world';
});
 
router.use(mw1, mw2);
 
app.use(router.middleware());

$ curl http://localhost:3000/test
// executing GET /foo
//=> 'hello world'

And here's an example of what that behavior looks like when we yield next from a route handler. The request will continue down the stack, possibly matching downstream handlers.

router.get('/test', function*(next) {
  console.log('executing handler1 and yielding next');
  yield* next;
});
 
router.get('/test', function*(next) {
  console.log('executing handler2 and responding');
  this.body = 'ok';
});
 
app.use(router.middleware());

$ curl http://localhost:3000/test
// executing handler1 and yielding next
// executing handler2 and responding
//=> 'ok'

You can also mount middleware to a specific route to be run before the handler:

router.get('/test', mw1, mw2, function*() {
  console.log('executing handler');
  this.body = 'ok';
});

$ curl http://localhost:3000/test
// executing mw1
// executing mw2
// executing handler
//=> 'ok'

And it handles flattens out arrays. These are all the same:

router.get('/test', mw1, mw2, mw3, mw4, mw5);
router.get('/test', [mw1, mw2, mw3, mw4], mw5);
router.get('/test', mw1, [mw2], mw3, [mw4, mw5]);
router.get('/test', [mw1, mw2, mw3, mw4, mw5]);

URL params

koa-wormhole uses path-to-regexp to turn route paths into regular expressions, so it has the same syntax as Express4's router and koa-router.

Read its docs for more examples.

koa-wormhole exposes URL params via the this.params object.

router.get('/users/:id', function*() {
  const user = yield database.findUserById(this.params.id);
  this.assert(user, 404);
 
  yield this.render('show_user.html', {
    ctx: this,
    user: user
  });
});

URL param middleware

You can DRY up repetitive logic with Router#param(key, middleware).

For example, it's useful for auto-loading resources.

router.param('user_id', function*(val, next) {
  this.resource = yield db.findUserById(val);
  this.assert(this.resource, 404);
  yield* next;
});
 
// `this.resource` is now guaranteed to exist in these handlers
router.get('/users/:user_id', ...);
router.get('/users/:user_id/edit', ...);
router.del('/users/:user_id', ...);
router.put('/users/:user_id', ...);
 
// and the param middleware will not be called for these
router.get('/users', ...);
router.post('/users', ...);

Method chaining

Router#use and all of the Router#{verb}s return the router instance, so you can chain them if you'd like.

router
  .get('/users', listUsers)
  .get('/users/:id', showUser)
  .use(ensureAdmin)  // <-- only applies to downstream routes
  .del('/users/:id', deleteUser);
  .get('/users/:id/admin-panel', administrateUser);
 
app.use(router.middleware());

Nested Routers

3-layers deep:

const app = koa();
const r1 = new Router(), r2 = new Router(), r3 = new Router();
 
r3.get('/', function*(next) {
  this.body = 'hello, world!';
});
r2.use(r3.middleware());
r1.use(r2.middleware());
app.use(r1.middleware());
 
app.listen(3000, () => console.log('listening on 3000'));

curl http://localhost:3000
// hello, world!

General idea

I thought it'd be fun to implement a router with koa-compose, composing one long chain of generator middleware for each router.

Goals:

• Predictable behavior
• Simple implementation

koa-wormhole vs Express 4's built-in router

• Express 4's routing docs: http://expressjs.com/guide/routing.html

The key difference is that koa-wormhole only pipes a request through a mounted router if the request actually matches one of the router's routes.

Consider this Express example:

// ------------------------------------------------------------
// router.js
// ------------------------------------------------------------
const router = require('express').Router();
 
router.use((req, res, next) {
  console.log('inside router middleware');
  next();
});
 
router.get('/router', (req, res, next) => {
  res.send('inside router route');
});
 
module.exports = router;
 
// ------------------------------------------------------------
// server.js
// ------------------------------------------------------------
const app = require('express')();
const router = require('./router');
 
app.use(router);
app.get('/', (req, res) => {
   res.send('homepage');
});
app.listen(3000, () => console.log('express listening on 3000'));

In Express, requests are always piped through routers, so top-level router middleware will always execute:

$ curl http://localhost:3000
// inside router middleware
//=> 'homepage'

$ curl http://localhost:3000/router
// inside router middleware
//=> 'inside router route'

Notice that the route's top-level middleware is always run.

Now let's look at the exact same example in koa-wormhole:

// ------------------------------------------------------------
// router.js
// ------------------------------------------------------------
const router = require('koa-wormhole')();
 
router.use(function*(next) {
  console.log('inside router middleware');
  yield* next;
});
 
router.get('/router', function*(next) {
  this.body = 'inside route route';
});
 
module.exports = router;
 
// ------------------------------------------------------------
// server.js
// ------------------------------------------------------------
const app = require('koa')();
const router = require('./router');
 
app.use(router.middleware());
app.get('/', function*() {
   this.body = 'homepage';
});
app.listen(3000, () => console.log('koa listening on 3000'));

$ curl http://localhost:3000
//=> 'homepage'

$ curl http://localhost:3000/router
// inside router middleware
//=> 'inside router route'

koa-wormhole skips over the router when requesting the homepage since the router had no matching route.

Why?

I just find this behavior more useful, and it's what I'm used to with koa-router.

I initially considered solutions that let you distinguish between router middleware that always runs and router middleware that only runs on router match, but I couldn't think of a use-case for that behavior.

koa-wormhole vs koa-router

koa-router has some undefined behavior and unexpected idiosyncrasies.

One example is that top-level koa-router middleware are always run before the matched handler. Consider this koa-router example:

router.get('/', function*() {
  console.log('executing router GET / handler');
  this.body = 'ok';
});
 
router.use(function*(next) {
  console.log('executing router middleware 1');
  yield* next;
});
 
router.use(function*(next) {
  console.log('executing router middleware 2');
  yield* next;
});
 
router.use(function*(next) {
  console.log('executing router middleware 3');
  yield* next;
});

$ curl http://localhost:3000
// executing router middleware 1
// executing router middleware 2
// executing router middleware 3
// executing router GET / handler
//=> 'ok'

I find this behavior unexpected and counter-intuitive. I'd expect the 'GET /' handler to execute first and only call the downstream middleware if it yields next, which is what koa-wormhole will do.

This may be a bug: https://github.com/alexmingoia/koa-router/issues/194

I tried to improve upon koa-router by following standard middleware intuition like declaration-order sensitivity.

License

MIT