node-gcm

The goal of this project is providing the best and most easily used interface for Firebase Cloud Messaging. (The name gcm comes from the older name for the service, Google Cloud Messaging.)

By April 11, 2019 users must have migrated from GCM to FCM. If you are using this library, we've already got you covered on the server side (since version 0.14.1) --- just update to the most recent version and you are good.

We appreciate all the help we can get! If you want to help out, check out the Guidelines for Contributing section.

If you are developing an open-source project with a broader scope (like a full Firebase suite), we would love for you to use node-gcm internally.

See the official FCM documentation for more information.

We are currently working on version 2.0.0 of the project, and it is available in an early alpha version. Follow PR #238 to see current status.

Installation

$ npm install node-gcm --save

Note: This package requires Node v4.0 and newer.

Requirements

This library provides the server-side implementation of FCM. You need to generate an API Key (Click the gear next to FCM project name) > Project Settings > Cloud Messaging -> Server Key).

FCM notifications can be sent to both Android and iOS. If you are new to FCM you should probably look into the documentation.

Example application

According to below Usage reference, we could create such application:

var gcm = require('node-gcm');

// Set up the sender with your GCM/FCM API key (declare this once for multiple messages)
var sender = new gcm.Sender('YOUR_API_KEY_HERE');

// Prepare a message to be sent
var message = new gcm.Message({
    data: { key1: 'msg1' }
});

// Specify which registration IDs to deliver the message to
var regTokens = ['YOUR_REG_TOKEN_HERE'];

// Actually send the message
sender.send(message, { registrationTokens: regTokens }, function (err, response) {
	if (err) console.error(err);
	else console.log(response);
});

Usage

var gcm = require('node-gcm');

// Create a message
// ... with default values
var message = new gcm.Message();

// ... or some given values
var message = new gcm.Message({
	collapseKey: 'demo',
	priority: 'high',
	contentAvailable: true,
	delayWhileIdle: true,
	timeToLive: 3,
	restrictedPackageName: "somePackageName",
	dryRun: true,
	data: {
		key1: 'message1',
		key2: 'message2'
	},
	notification: {
		title: "Hello, World",
		icon: "ic_launcher",
		body: "This is a notification that will be displayed if your app is in the background."
	}
});

// Change the message data
// ... as key-value
message.addData('key1','message1');
message.addData('key2','message2');

// ... or as a data object (overwrites previous data object)
message.addData({
	key1: 'message1',
	key2: 'message2'
});

// Set up the sender with you API key
var sender = new gcm.Sender('insert Google Server API Key here');

// Add the registration tokens of the devices you want to send to
var registrationTokens = [];
registrationTokens.push('regToken1');
registrationTokens.push('regToken2');

// Send the message
// ... trying only once
sender.sendNoRetry(message, { registrationTokens: registrationTokens }, function(err, response) {
  if(err) console.error(err);
  else    console.log(response);
});

// ... or retrying
sender.send(message, { registrationTokens: registrationTokens }, function (err, response) {
  if(err) console.error(err);
  else    console.log(response);
});

// ... or retrying a specific number of times (10)
sender.send(message, { registrationTokens: registrationTokens }, 10, function (err, response) {
  if(err) console.error(err);
  else    console.log(response);
});

// Q: I need to remove all "bad" token from my database, how do I do that?
//    The results-array does not contain any tokens!
// A: The array of tokens used for sending will match the array of results, so you can cross-check them.
sender.send(message, { registrationTokens: registrationTokens }, function (err, response) {
  var failed_tokens = registrationTokens.filter((token, i) => response[i].error != null);
  console.log('These tokens are no longer ok:', failed_tokens);
});

Recipients

You can send push notifications to various recipient types by providing one of the following recipient keys:

Key	Type	Description
to	String	A single registration token, notification key, or topic.
topic	String	A single publish/subscribe topic.
condition	String	Multiple topics using the condition parameter.
notificationKey	String	Deprecated. A key that groups multiple registration tokens linked to the same user.
registrationIds	String[]	Deprecated. Use registrationTokens instead.
registrationTokens	String[]	A list of registration tokens. Must contain at least 1 and at most 1000 registration tokens.

If you provide an incorrect recipient key or object type, an Error object will be returned to your callback.

Notice that you can at most send notifications to 1000 registration tokens at a time. This is due to a restriction on the side of the FCM API.

Additional message options

Parameter	Usage	Description
collapseKey	Optional, string	This parameter identifies a group of messages that can be collapsed, so that only the last message gets sent when delivery can be resumed.
priority	Optional, string	Sets the priority of the message. Valid values are "normal" and "high."
contentAvailable	Optional, JSON boolean	On iOS, when a notification or message is sent and this is set to true, an inactive client app is awoken.
mutableContent	Optional, JSON boolean	On iOS, Currently for iOS 10+ devices only. On iOS, use this field to represent mutable-content in the APNs payload. When a notification is sent and this is set to true, the content of the notification can be modified before it is displayed, using a Notification Service app extension.
timeToLive	Optional, JSON number	This parameter specifies how long (in seconds) the message should be kept in FCM storage if the device is offline. The maximum time to live supported is 4 weeks, and the default value is 4 weeks.
restrictedPackageName	Optional, string	This parameter specifies the package name of the application where the registration tokens must match in order to receive the message.
dryRun	Optional, JSON boolean	This parameter, when set to true, allows developers to test a request without actually sending a message.
data	Optional, JSON object	This parameter specifies the custom key-value pairs of the message's payload.
notification	Optional, JSON object	This parameter specifies the predefined, user-visible key-value pairs of the notification payload. See "Notification payload option table" below for more details.
fcm_options	Optional, JSON object	This parameter is used to pass FCM specific options, as outlined here.

Notification usage

var message = new gcm.Message();

// Add notification payload as key value
message.addNotification('title', 'Alert!!!');
message.addNotification('body', 'Abnormal data access');
message.addNotification('icon', 'ic_launcher');

// as object
message.addNotification({
  title: 'Alert!!!',
  body: 'Abnormal data access',
  icon: 'ic_launcher'
});

Note: Notifications sent using message.addNotification are only displayed when your app is in the background. Consider sending the notification parameters using message.addData and manually building and displaying a notification in your push receiver logic.

Notification payload option table

Parameter	Platform	Usage	Description
title	Android, iOS (Watch)	Required (Android), Optional (iOS), string	Indicates notification title. This field is not visible on iOS phones and tablets.
body	Android, iOS	Optional, string	Indicates notification body text.
icon	Android	Required, string	Indicates notification icon. On Android: sets value to myicon for drawable resource myicon.png.
sound	Android, iOS	Optional, string	Indicates sound to be played. Supports only default currently.
badge	iOS	Optional, string	Indicates the badge on client app home icon.
tag	Android	Optional, string	Indicates whether each notification message results in a new entry on the notification center on Android. If not set, each request creates a new notification. If set, and a notification with the same tag is already being shown, the new notification replaces the existing one in notification center.
color	Android	Optional, string	Indicates color of the icon, expressed in #rrggbb format
click_action	Android, iOS	Optional, string	The action associated with a user click on the notification. On Android, if this is set, an activity with a matching intent filter is launched when user clicks the notification. For example, if one of your Activities includes the intent filter: (Appendix:1)Set click_action to OPEN_ACTIVITY_1 to open it. If set, corresponds to category in APNS payload.
body_loc_key	iOS	Optional, string	Indicates the key to the body string for localization. On iOS, this corresponds to "loc-key" in APNS payload.
body_loc_args	iOS	Optional, JSON array as string	Indicates the string value to replace format specifiers in body string for localization. On iOS, this corresponds to "loc-args" in APNS payload.
title_loc_args	iOS	Optional, JSON array as string	Indicates the string value to replace format specifiers in title string for localization. On iOS, this corresponds to "title-loc-args" in APNS payload.
title_loc_key	iOS	Optional, string	Indicates the key to the title string for localization. On iOS, this corresponds to "title-loc-key" in APNS payload.

Notice notification payload defined in FCM Connection Server Reference

Custom HTTP request options

You can provide custom request options such as proxy and timeout for the HTTP request to the FCM API. For more information, refer to the complete list of request options. Note that the following options cannot be overriden: method, uri, body, as well as the following headers: Authorization, Content-Type, and Content-Length.

// Set custom request options
var requestOptions = {
	proxy: 'http://127.0.0.1:8888',
	timeout: 5000
};

// Set up the sender with your API key and request options
var sender = new gcm.Sender('YOUR_API_KEY_HERE', requestOptions);

// Prepare a GCM message...

// Send it to GCM endpoint with modified request options
sender.send(message, { registrationTokens: regTokens }, function (err, response) {
    if(err) console.error(err);
    else     console.log(response);
});

FCM client compatibility

As of January 9th, 2016, there are a few known compatibility issues with 3rd-party FCM client libraries:

phonegap-plugin-push

• No support for subscribing to PubSub topics
• Requirement for data payload object when sending a notification object
• Requirement for all 3 notification fields when sending a notification object (title, icon, message)

These issues are out of this project's context and can only be fixed by the respective 3rd-party project maintainers.

Debug

To enable debug mode (print requests and responses to and from FCM), set the DEBUG environment flag when running your app (assuming you use node app.js to run your app):

DEBUG=node-gcm node app.js

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