Sieste

REST, lazily: transform any (limit, offset) resource interface into an asynchronous iterable.

Installation

$ npm install sieste

API

var iter = sieste([opts], fn)

Returns a new iterable for the given fetching function fn.

• opts {Object} Pre-fetching configuration. Two keys are available:

  • lowWaterMark (number of cached elements when to send a pre-fetch request). [default: 2]
  • highWaterMark (maximum number of elements cached at one time in one direction). [default: 5]

• fn(limit, offset, params, cb) {Function} Function used to load the iterable. This function takes the following arguments:

  • limit {Number} Number of elements to fetch.
  • offset {Number} Starting offset of first element to fetch.
  • params {Object} Passed through from reset.
  • cb(err, elems) {Function} If the list of elements returned is shorter than the total amount of elements asked for, the resource will be considered exhausted.

Note that sieste doesn't make any assumptions on how your underlying resource is served and will simply take care of calling this method appropriately (handling pre-fetching and caching for you).

iter.reset(params, [index], cb)

Reset the iterable, changing the underlying resource.

• params {Object} Parameters used to set the resource used (this will be passed to each call to fn).
• index {Number} Optional start index. Note that an error will occur if this index is set to a value greater than the total amount of elements in the resource. [default: 0]
• cb(err, elem) {Function} Callback to which the element at index will be passed.

iter.next(cb)

Retrieve next element.

• cb(err, elem) {Function} Callback to which the next element will be passed (null if end of iterable).

iter.prev(cb)

Retrieve previous element.

• cb(err, elem) {Function} Callback to which the previous element will be passed (null if beginning of iterable).

Quickstart

Sample implementations for a standard REST resource.

jQuery AJAX

// Assuming $ and Sieste available on the global object.
 
var iter = sieste(function (limit, offset, params, cb) {
 
  $.ajax({
    url: params.protocol + '//' + params.hostname + '/' + params.pathname,
    data: {limit: limit, offset: offset},
    type: 'GET'
  }).done(function (data) { cb(null, data); })
    .fail(function (xhr) { cb(xhr); });
 
});

node.js

var http = require('http'),
    url = require('url'),
    sieste = require('sieste');
 
var iter = sieste(function (limit, offset, params, cb) {
 
  var formattedUrl = url.format({
    protocol: 'http',
    hostname: params.hostname,
    port: params.port,
    pathname: params.pathname,
    query: {limit: limit, offset: offset}
  });
  http.get(formattedUrl, function (res) {
    var data = '';
    var obj;
    res
      .on('data', function (chunk) { data += chunk; })
      .on('end', function () {
        try {
          obj = JSON.parse(data);
        } catch (err) {
          cb(err);
          return;
        }
        cb(null, obj);
      });
  });
 
});

These iterables can then be used in the same way, for example:

// Assuming params points to the resource's URL.
 
iter.reset(params, function (err, elem) {
 
  console.log('Got elem ' + elem + '!');
 
});