leroyg / meteor-restivus

REST APIs for the Best of Us! - A Meteor 0.9+ package for building REST APIs https://atmospherejs.com/nimble/restivus

Restivus

REST APIs for the Best of Us!

Restivus makes building REST APIs in Meteor 0.9.0+ easier than ever before! The package is inspired by RestStop2 and Collection API, and is built on top of Iron Router's server-side routing to provide:

• A simple interface for creating REST APIs
• Easily setup CRUD endpoints for Mongo Collections
• User authentication via the API
  • Optional login and logout endpoints
  • Access to this.user in authenticated endpoints
  • Custom authentication if needed
• Role permissions for limiting access to specific endpoints
  • Works alongside the alanning:roles package - Meteor's accepted role permission package
• And coming soon:
  • Basic versioning of routes and endpoints
  • JSON PATCH support on collections
  • Autogenerated OPTIONS endpoint on routes
  • Pre and post hooks on all endpoints

Installation

You can install Restivus using Meteor's package manager:

> meteor add nimble:restivus

And to update Restivus to the latest version:

> meteor update nimble:restivus

Quick Start

CoffeeScript:

Items = new Mongo.Collection 'items'

if Meteor.isServer

  # Global API configuration
  Restivus.configure
    useAuth: true
    prettyJson: true

  # Generates: GET, POST, DELETE on /api/items and GET, PUT, DELETE on
  # /api/items/:id for Items collection
  Restivus.addCollection Items

  # Generates: GET, POST on /api/users and GET, DELETE /api/users/:id for
  # Meteor.users collection
  Restivus.addCollection Meteor.users,
    excludedEndpoints: ['deleteAll', 'put']
    routeOptions:
      authRequired: true
    endpoints:
      post:
        authRequired: false
      delete:
        roleRequired: 'admin'

  # Maps to: /api/posts/:id
  Restivus.addRoute 'posts/:id', authRequired: true,
    get: ->
      post = Posts.findOne @urlParams.id
      if post
        status: 'success', data: post
      else
        statusCode: 404
        body: status: 'fail', message: 'Post not found'
    post:
      roleRequired: ['author', 'admin']
      action: ->
        post = Posts.findOne @urlParams.id
        if post
          status: "success", data: post
        else
          statusCode: 400
          body: status: "fail", message: "Unable to add post"
    delete:
      roleRequired: 'admin'
      action: ->
        if Posts.remove @urlParams.id
          status: "success", data: message: "Item removed"
        else
          statusCode: 404
          body: status: "fail", message: "Item not found"

JavaScript:

Items = new Mongo.Collection('items');

if(Meteor.isServer) {

  // Global API configuration
  Restivus.configure({
    useAuth: true,
    prettyJson: true
  });

  // Generates: GET, POST, DELETE on /api/items and GET, PUT, DELETE on
  // /api/items/:id for Items collection
  Restivus.addCollection(Items);

  // Generates: GET, POST on /api/users and GET, DELETE /api/users/:id for
  // Meteor.users collection
  Restivus.addCollection(Meteor.users, {
    excludedEndpoints: ['deleteAll', 'put'],
    routeOptions: {
      authRequired: true
    },
    endpoints: {
      post: {
        authRequired: false
      },
      delete: {
        roleRequired: 'admin'
      }
    }
  });

  // Maps to: /api/posts/:id
  Restivus.addRoute('posts/:id', {authRequired: true}, {
    get: function () {
      var post = Posts.findOne(this.urlParams.id);
      if (post) {
        return {status: 'success', data: post};
      }
      return {
        statusCode: 404,
        body: {status: 'fail', message: 'Post not found'}
      };
    },
    post: {
      roleRequired: ['author', 'admin'],
      action: function () {
        var post = Posts.findOne(this.urlParams.id);
        if (post) {
          return {status: "success", data: post};
        }
        return {
          statusCode: 400,
          body: {status: "fail", message: "Unable to add post"}
        };
      }
    },
    delete: {
      roleRequired: 'admin',
      action: function () {
        if (Posts.remove(this.urlParams.id)) {
          return {status: "success", data: {message: "Item removed"}};
        }
        return {
          statusCode: 404,
          body: {status: "fail", message: "Item not found"}
        };
      }
    }
  });
}

Table of Contents

• Upgrading from 0.5.x
• Upgrading from 0.6.0
• Terminology
• Writing a Restivus API
  • Configuration Options
  • Defining Collection Routes
    • Collection
    • Collection Options
      • Route Configuration
      • Endpoint Configuration
    • Request and Response Structure
    • Users Collection Endpoints
  • Defining Custom Routes
    • Path Structure
    • Route Options
    • Defining Endpoints
      • Endpoint Configuration
      • Endpoint Context
      • Response Data
  • Documenting Your API
• Consuming a Restivus API
  • Basic Usage
  • Authenticating
  • Authenticated Calls
• Resources
  • Change Log
  • Contributing

Upgrading from 0.5.x

Restivus v0.6.1 brings support for easily generating REST endpoints for your Mongo Collections, and with that comes a few API-breaking changes:

• The Restivus.add() method has been changed to Restivus.addRoute() for clarity, now that the Restivus.addCollection() method has been added.
• All responses generated by Restivus now follow the JSend format, with one minor tweak: failures have an identical structure to errors (check out the JSend documentation for more details on the response structure, which will be demonstrated throughout these docs). Just to be clear, this only affects responses that are automatically generated by Restivus. Any responses you manually created will remain unaffected.

Please see the change log for more information about the changes between each version.

Upgrading from 0.6.0

WARNING! Do not use v0.6.0! Please upgrade to v0.6.1 or above.

v0.6.0 does not allow you to work with existing collections, or access collections created in Restivus elsewhere in your app, which is not the intended behavior. Since Meteor expects you to construct each collection only once (using new Mongo.Collection()), and store that globally, Restivus now requires that you pass an existing collection in Restivus.addCollection(). Please check out the updated section on defining collection routes for a detailed breakdown of the parameters to Restivus.addCollection().

Terminology

Just to clarify some terminology that will be used throughout these docs:

(HTTP) Method:

• The type of HTTP request (e.g., GET, PUT, POST, etc.)

Endpoint:

• The function executed when a request is made at a given URL path for a specific HTTP method

Route:

• A URL path and its set of configurable endpoints

Writing A Restivus API

Configuration Options

The following configuration options are available with Restivus.configure (must be called once, but all properties are optional):

apiPath

• String
• Default: 'api/'
• The base path for your API. If you use 'api' and add a route called 'users', the URL will be https://yoursite.com/api/users/.

defaultHeaders

• Object
• Default: { 'Content-Type': 'application/json' }
• The response headers that will be returned from every endpoint by default. These can be overridden by returning headers of the same name from any endpoint.

useAuth

• Boolean
• Default: false
• If true, POST /login and GET /logout endpoints are added to the API. You can access this.user and this.userId in authenticated endpoints.

auth

• Object
  • token String
    • Default: 'services.resume.loginTokens.token'
    • The path to the auth token in the Meteor.user document. This location will be checked for a matching token if one is returned in auth.user().
  • user Function

    • Default: Get user ID and auth token from X-User-Id and X-Auth-Token headers

      function() {
        return {
          userId: this.request.headers['x-user-id'],
          token: this.request.headers['x-auth-token']
        };
      }

    • Provides one of two levels of authentication, depending on the data returned. The context within this function is the endpoint context without this.user and this.userId (well, that's what we're working on here!). Once the user authentication completes successfully, the authenticated user and their ID will be attached to the endpoint context. The two levels of custom authentication and their required return data are:

      • Partial auth
        • userId: The ID of the user being authenticated
        • token: The auth token to be verified
        • If both a userId and token are returned, authentication will succeed if the token exists in the given Meteor.user document at the location specified in auth.token
      • Complete auth
        • user: The fully authenticated Meteor.user
        • This is your chance to completely override the user authentication process. If a user is returned, any userId and token will be ignored, as it's assumed that you have already successfully authenticated the user (by whatever means you deem necessary). The given user is simply attached to the endpoint context, no questions asked.

prettyJson

• Boolean
• Default: false
• If true, render formatted JSON in response.

onLoggedIn

• Function
• Default: undefined
• A hook that runs once a user has been successfully logged into their account via the /login endpoint. Context is the same as within authenticated endpoints. Any returned data will be added to the response body as data.extra (coming soon).

onLoggedOut

• Function
• Default: undefined
• Same as onLoggedIn, but runs once a user has been successfully logged out of their account via the /logout endpoint. Context is the same as within authenticated endpoints. Any returned data will be added to the response body as data.extra (coming soon).

useClientRouter

• Boolean
• Default: true
• If false, disable Iron Router on the client. This is recommended if you're not using Iron Router for your client-side routing. Note: Since this needs to be configured on the client, you must call Restivus.configure() in a file available on both the client and server (e.g., common.js) for this to actually take effect.

  Restivus.configure
    useAuth: true
    apiPath: 'my-api/'
    prettyJson: true
    auth:
      token: 'auth.apiKey'
      user: ->
        userId: @request.headers['user-id']
        token: @request.headers['login-token']
    onLoggedIn: -> console.log "#{@user.username} (#{@userId}) logged in"
    onLoggedOut: -> console.log "#{@user.username} (#{@userId}) logged out"
    useClientRouter: false

enableCors

• Boolean
• Default: true
• If true, enables cross-origin resource sharing (CORS). This allows your API to receive requests from any domain (when false, the API will only accept requests from the domain where the API is being hosted. Note: Only applies to requests originating from browsers).

Defining Collection Routes

One of the most common uses for a REST API is exposing a set of operations on your collections. Well, you're in luck, because this is almost too easy with Restivus! All available REST endpoints (except patch and options, for now) can be generated for a Mongo Collection using Restivus.addCollection(). This generates two routes by default:

/api/<collection>

• Operations on the entire collection
• GET,POST, and DELETE

/api/<collection>/:id

• Operations on a single entity within the collection
• GET, PUT, and DELETE

Collection

The first - and only required - parameter of Restivus.addCollection() is a Mongo Collection. Please check out the Meteor docs for more on creating collections. The Meteor.users collection will have [special endpoints] (#users-collection-endpoints) generated.

Collection Options

Route and endpoint configuration options are available in Restivus.addCollection() (as the 2nd, optional parameter).

Route Configuration

The top level properties of the options apply to both routes that will be generated (/api/<collection> and /api/<collection>/:id):

path

• String
• Default: Name of the collection (the name passed to new Mongo.Collection(), or 'users' for Meteor.users)
• The base path for the generated routes. Given a path 'other-path', routes will be generated at 'api/other-path' and 'api/other-path/:id'

routeOptions

• Object
• authRequired Boolean
  • Default: false
  • If true, all endpoints on these routes will return a 401 if the user is not properly authenticated.
• roleRequired String or Array of Strings
  • Default: undefined (no role required)
  • The acceptable user roles for all endpoints on this route (e.g., 'admin', ['admin', 'dev']). Additional role permissions can be defined on specific endpoints. If the authenticated user does not belong to at least one of the accepted roles, a 401 is returned. Since a role cannot be verified without an authenticated user, setting the roleRequired implies authRequired: true, so that option can be omitted without any consequence. For more on setting up roles, check out the alanning:roles package.

excludedEndpoints

• String or Array of Strings
• Default: undefined
• The names of the endpoints that should not be generated (see the endpoints option below for a complete list of endpoint names).

endpoints

• Object
• Default: undefined (all available endpoints generated)
• Each property of this object corresponds to a REST endpoint. In addition to the excludedEndpoints list, you can also prevent an endpoint from being generated by setting its value to false. All other endpoints will be generated. The complete set of configurable properties on these endpoints is described in the Endpoint Configuration section below. Here is a list of all available endpoints, including their corresponding HTTP method, path, and a short description of their behavior:
  • getAll Endpoint
    • GET /api/collection
    • Return a list of all entities within the collection (filtered searching via query params coming soon!).
  • deleteAll Endpoint
    • DELETE /api/collection
    • Remove all entities in the collection. Be very careful with this endpoint! This should probably only be used for development or by users with a specific role, like 'admin'.
  • post Endpoint
    • POST /api/collection
    • Add a new entity to the collection. All data passed in the request body will be copied into the newly created entity. Warning: This is unsafe for now, as no type or bounds checking is done.
  • get Endpoint
    • GET /api/collection/:id
    • Return the entity with the given :id.
  • put Endpoint
    • PUT /api/collection/:id
    • Completely replace the entity with the given :id with the data contained in the request body. Any fields not included will be removed from the document in the collection.
  • delete Endpoint
    • DELETE /api/collection/:id
    • Remove the entity with the given :id from the collection.

Endpoint Configuration

By default, each of the endpoints listed above is undefined, which means it will be generated with any default route options. If you need finer control over your endpoints, each can be defined as an object containing the following properties:

authRequired

• Boolean
• Default: undefined
• If true, this endpoint will return a 401 if the user is not properly [authenticated] (#authenticating). If defined, this overrides the option of the same name defined on the entire route.

roleRequired

• String or Array of Strings
• Default: undefined (no role required)
• The acceptable user roles for this endpoint (e.g., 'admin', ['admin', 'dev']). These roles will be accepted in addition to any defined over the entire route. If the authenticated user does not belong to at least one of the accepted roles, a 401 is returned. Since a role cannot be verified without an authenticated user, setting the roleRequired implies authRequired: true, so that option can be omitted without any consequence. For more on setting up roles, check out the alanning:roles package.

action

• Function
• Default: undefined (Default endpoint generated)
• If you need to completely override the default endpoint behavior, you can provide a function that will be executed when the corresponding request is made. No parameters are passed; instead, this contains the endpoint context, with properties including the URL and query parameters.

Request and Response Structure

All responses generated by Restivus follow the JSend format, with one minor tweak: failures have an identical structure to errors. Sample requests and responses for each endpoint are included below:

post

Request:

curl -X POST http://localhost:3000/api/posts/ -d "title=Witty Title" -d "author=Jack Rose"

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "_id": "LrcEYNojn5N7NPRdo",
    "title": "Witty Title",
    "author": "Jack Rose"
  }
}

getAll

Request:

curl -X GET http://localhost:3000/api/posts/

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": [
    {
      "_id": "LrcEYNojn5N7NPRdo",
      "title": "Witty Title!",
      "author": "Jack Rose",
    },
    {
      "_id": "7F89EFivTnAcPMcY5",
      "title": "Average Stuff",
      "author": "Joe Schmoe",
    }
  ]
}

deleteAll

Request:

curl -X DELETE http://localhost:3000/api/posts/

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "message": "Removed 2 items"
  }
}

get

Request:

curl -X GET http://localhost:3000/api/posts/LrcEYNojn5N7NPRdo

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "_id": "LrcEYNojn5N7NPRdo",
    "title": "Witty Title",
    "author": "Jack Rose",
  }
}

put

Request:

curl -X PUT http://localhost:3000/api/posts/LrcEYNojn5N7NPRdo -d "title=Wittier Title" -d "author=Jaclyn Rose"

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "_id": "LrcEYNojn5N7NPRdo",
    "title": "Wittier Title",
    "author": "Jaclyn Rose"
  }
}

delete

Request:

curl -X DELETE http://localhost:3000/api/posts/LrcEYNojn5N7NPRdo

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "message": "Item removed"
  }
}

Users Collection Endpoints

A few special exceptions have been made for routes added for the Meteor.users collection. For now, the majority of the operations are limited to read access to the user._id and read/write access to the user.profile. All route and endpoint options are identical to those described for all other collections above. No options have been configured in the examples below; however, it is highly recommended that role permissions be setup (or at the absolute least, authentication required) for the delete and deleteAll endpoints. Below are sample requests and responses for the users collection.

Create collection:

Restivus.addCollection(Meteor.users);

post

Request: POST http://localhost:3000/api/users

{
  "email": "[email protected]",
  "password": "password",
  "profile": {
    "firstName": "Jack",
    "lastName": "Rose"
  }
}

Note: The only fields that will be recognized in the request body when creating a new user are email, username, password, and profile. These map directly to the parameters of the same name in the Accounts.createUser() method, so check that out for more information on how those fields are handled.

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "_id": "oFpdgAMMr7F5A7P3a",
    "profile": {
      "firstName": "Jack",
      "lastName": "Rose"
    }
  }
}

getAll

Request:

curl -X GET http://localhost:3000/api/users/

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": [
    {
      "_id": "nBTnv83sTrf38fFTi",
      "profile": {
        "firstName": "Anthony",
        "lastName": "Reid"
      }
    },
    {
      "_id": "oFpdgAMMr7F5A7P3a",
      "profile": {
        "firstName": "Jack",
        "lastName": "Rose"
      }
    }
  ]
}

deleteAll

Request:

curl -X DELETE http://localhost:3000/api/users/

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "message": "Removed 2 users"
  }
}

get

Request:

curl -X GET http://localhost:3000/api/users/oFpdgAMMr7F5A7P3a

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "_id": "oFpdgAMMr7F5A7P3a",
    "profile": {
      "firstName": "Jack",
      "lastName": "Rose"
    }
  }
}

put

Request: PUT http://localhost:3000/api/users/oFpdgAMMr7F5A7P3a

{
    "firstName": "Jaclyn",
    "age": 25
}

Note: The data included in the request body will completely overwrite the user.profile field of the User document

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "_id": "oFpdgAMMr7F5A7P3a",
    "profile": {
      "firstName": "Jaclyn",
      "age": "25"
    }
  }
}

delete

Request:

curl -X DELETE http://localhost:3000/api/users/oFpdgAMMr7F5A7P3a

Response:

{
  "status": "success",
  "data": {
    "message": "User removed"
  }
}

Defining Custom Routes

Routes are defined using Restivus.addRoute(). A route consists of a path and a set of endpoints defined at that path.

Path Structure

The path is the 1st parameter of Restivus.addRoute. You can pass it a string or regex. If you pass it test/path, the full path will be https://yoursite.com/api/test/path.

Paths can have variable parameters. For example, you can create a route to show a post with a specific id. The id is variable depending on the post you want to see such as "/posts/1" or "/posts/2". To declare a named parameter in the path, use the : syntax followed by the parameter name. When a user goes to that url, the actual value of the parameter will be stored as a property on this.urlParams in your endpoint function.

In this example we have a parameter named _id. If we navigate to the /post/5 url in our browser, inside of the GET endpoint function we can get the actual value of the _id from this.urlParams._id. In this case this.urlParams._id => 5.

CoffeeScript:

# Given a url like "/post/5"
Restivus.addRoute '/post/:_id',
  get: ->
    id = @urlParams._id # "5"

JavaScript:

// Given a url "/post/5"
Restivus.addRoute('/post/:_id', {
  get: function () {
    var id = this.urlParams._id; // "5"
  }
});

You can have multiple URL parameters. In this example, we have an _id parameter and a commentId parameter. If you navigate to the url /post/5/comments/100 then inside your endpoint function this.urlParams._id => 5 and this.urlParams.commentId => 100.

CoffeeScript:

# Given a url "/post/5/comments/100"
Restivus.addRoute '/post/:_id/comments/:commentId',
  get: ->
    id = @urlParams._id # "5"
    commentId = @urlParams.commentId # "100"

JavaScript:

// Given a url "/post/5/comments/100"
Restivus.addRoute('/post/:_id/comments/:commentId', {
  get: function () {
    var id = this.urlParams._id; // "5"
    var commentId = this.urlParams.commentId; // "100"
  }
});

If there is a query string in the url, you can access that using this.queryParams.

Coffeescript:

# Given the url: "/post/5?q=liked#hash_fragment"
Restivus.addRoute '/post/:_id',
  get: ->
    id = @urlParams._id
    query = @queryParams # query.q -> "liked"

JavaScript:

// Given the url: "/post/5?q=liked#hash_fragment"
Restivus.addRoute('/post/:_id', {
  get: function () {
    var id = this.urlParams._id;
    var query = this.queryParams; // query.q -> "liked"
  }
});

Route Options

The following options are available in Restivus.addRoute (as the 2nd, optional parameter):

authRequired

• Boolean
• Default: false
• If true, all endpoints on this route will return a 401 if the user is not properly authenticated.

roleRequired

• String or Array of Strings
• Default: undefined (no role required)
• A string or array of strings corresponding to the acceptable user roles for all endpoints on this route (e.g., 'admin', ['admin', 'dev']). Additional role permissions can be defined on specific endpoints. If the authenticated user does not belong to at least one of the accepted roles, a 401 is returned. Since a role cannot be verified without an authenticated user, setting the roleRequired implies authRequired: true, so that option can be omitted without any consequence. For more on setting up roles, check out the alanning:roles package.

Defining Endpoints

The last parameter of Restivus.addRoute is an object with properties corresponding to the supported HTTP methods. At least one method must have an endpoint defined on it. The following endpoints can be defined in Restivus:

• get
• post
• put
• patch
• delete
• options

These endpoints can be defined one of two ways. First, you can simply provide a function for each method you want to support at the given path. The corresponding endpoint will be executed when that type of request is made at that path.

For finer-grained control over each endpoint, you can also define each one as an object containing the endpoint action and some addtional configuration options.

Endpoint Configuration

An action is required when configuring an endpoint. All other configuration settings are optional, and will get their default values from the route.

action

• Function
• Default: undefined
• A function that will be executed when a request is made for the corresponding HTTP method.

authRequired

• String
• Default: Route.authRequired
• If true, this endpoint will return a 401 if the user is not properly authenticated. Overrides the option of the same name defined on the entire route.

roleRequired

• String or Array of Strings
• Default: Route.roleRequired
• The acceptable user roles for this endpoint (e.g., 'admin', ['admin', 'dev']). These roles will be accepted in addition to any defined over the entire route. If the authenticated user does not belong to at least one of the accepted roles, a 401 is returned. Since a role cannot be verified without an authenticated user, setting the roleRequired implies authRequired: true, so that option can be omitted without any consequence. For more on setting up roles, check out the alanning:roles package.

CoffeeScript

Restivus.addRoute 'posts', {authRequired: true},
  get:
    authRequired: false
    action: ->
      # GET api/posts
  post: ->
    # POST api/posts
  put: ->
    # PUT api/posts
  patch: ->
    # PATCH api/posts
  delete: ->
    # DELETE api/posts
  options: ->
    # OPTIONS api/posts

JavaScript

Restivus.addRoute('posts', {authRequired: true}, {
  get: function () {
    authRequired: false
    action: function () {
      // GET api/posts
    }
  },
  post: function () {
    // POST api/posts
  },
  put: function () {
    // PUT api/posts
  },
  patch: function () {
    // PATCH api/posts
  },
  delete: function () {
    // DELETE api/posts
  },
  options: function () {
    // OPTIONS api/posts
  }
});

In the above examples, all the endpoints except the GETs will require [authentication] (#authenticating).

Endpoint Context

Each endpoint has access to:

this.user

• Meteor.user
• The authenticated Meteor.user. Only available if useAuth and authRequired are both true. If not, it will be undefined.

this.userId

• String
• The authenticated user's Meteor.userId. Only available if useAuth and authRequired are both true. If not, it will be undefined.

this.urlParams

• Object
• Non-optional parameters extracted from the URL. A parameter id on the path posts/:id would be available as this.urlParams.id.

this.queryParams

• Object
• Optional query parameters from the URL. Given the url https://yoursite.com/posts?likes=true, this.queryParams.likes => true.

this.bodyParams

• Object
• Parameters passed in the request body. Given the request body { "friend": { "name": "Jack" } }, this.bodyParams.friend.name => "Jack".

this.request

• Node request object

this.response

• Node response object
• If you handle the response yourself using this.response.write() or this.response.writeHead() you must call this.done(). In addition to preventing the default response (which will throw an error if you've initiated the response yourself), it will also close the connection using this.response.end(), so you can safely omit that from your endpoint.

this.done()

• Function

• Must be called after handling the response manually with this.response.write() or this.response.writeHead(). This must be called immediately before returning from an endpoint.

  Restivus.addRoute('manualResponse', {
    get: function () {
      console.log('Testing manual response');
      this.response.write('This is a manual response');
      this.done();  // Must call this immediately before return!
    }
  });

this.<endpointOption>

All endpoint configuration options can be accessed by name (e.g., this.roleRequired). Within an endpoint, all options have been completely resolved, meaning all configuration options set on an endpoint's route will already be applied to the endpoint as defaults. So if you set authRequired: true on a route and do not set the authRequired option on one if its endpoints, this.authRequired will still be true within that endpoint, since the default will already have been applied from the route.

Response Data

You can return a raw string:

return "That's current!";

A JSON object:

return { json: 'object' };

A raw array:

return [ 'red', 'green', 'blue' ];

Or include a statusCode or headers. At least one must be provided along with the body:

return {
  statusCode: 404,
  headers: {
    'Content-Type': 'text/plain',
    'X-Custom-Header': 'custom value'
  },
  body: {
    status: 'success',
    data: {
      message: 'There is nothing here!'
    }
  }
};

All responses contain the following defaults, which will be overridden with any provided values:

statusCode

• Default: 200

headers

• Default:
  • Content-Type: application/json
  • Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *
    • This is a CORS-compliant header that allows requests to be made to the API from any domain. Without this, requests from within the browser would only be allowed from the same domain the API is hosted on, which is typically not the intended behavior. This can be disabled by default, or also by returning a header of the same name with a domain specified (usually the domain the API is being hosted on).

Documenting Your API

What's a REST API without awesome docs? I'll tell you: absolutely freaking useless. So to fix that, we use and recommend apiDoc. It allows you to generate beautiful and extremely handy API docs from your JavaScript or CoffeeScript comments. It supports other comment styles as well, but we're Meteorites, so who cares? Check it out. Use it.

Consuming A Restivus API

The following uses the above code.

Basic Usage

We can call our POST /posts/:id/comments endpoint the following way. Note the /api/ in the URL (defined with the api_path option above):

curl -d "message=Some message details" http://localhost:3000/api/posts/3/comments

Authenticating

If you have useAuth set to true, you now have a POST /api/login endpoint that returns a userId and authToken. You must save these, and include them in subsequent requests.

Warning: Make sure you're using HTTPS, otherwise this is insecure! In an ideal world, this should only be done with DDP and SRP, but, alas, this is a REST API.

curl http://localhost:3000/api/login/ -d "password=testpassword&user=test"

The response will look like this, which you must save (for subsequent authenticated requests):

{ status: "success", data: {authToken: "f2KpRW7KeN9aPmjSZ", userId: fbdpsNf4oHiX79vMJ} }

You also have an authenticated GET /api/logout endpoint for logging a user out. If successful, the auth token that is passed in the request header will be invalidated (removed from the user account), so it will not work in any subsequent requests.

curl http://localhost:3000/api/logout -H "X-Auth-Token: f2KpRW7KeN9aPmjSZ" -H "X-User-Id: fbdpsNf4oHiX79vMJ"

Authenticated Calls

For any endpoints that require the default authentication, you must include the userId and authToken with each request under the following headers:

• X-User-Id
• X-Auth-Token

curl -H "X-Auth-Token: f2KpRW7KeN9aPmjSZ" -H "X-User-Id: fbdpsNf4oHiX79vMJ" http://localhost:3000/api/posts/

Resources

Change Log

A detailed list of the changes between versions can be found in the [change log] (https://github.com/kahmali/meteor-restivus/blob/master/CHANGELOG.md).

Contributing

Contributions to Restivus are welcome and appreciated! If you're interested in contributing, please check out the guidelines before getting started.

Thanks

Thanks to the developers over at Differential for RestStop2, where we got our inspiration for this package and stole tons of ideas and code, as well as the Iron Router team for giving us a solid foundation with their server-side routing in Meteor.

Also, thanks to the following projects, which RestStop2 was inspired by:

• gkoberger/meteor-reststop
• tmeasday/meteor-router
• crazytoad/meteor-collectionapi

License

MIT License. See LICENSE for details.