First some context, I have an async function which logs messages on a MongoDB database.
async function log_message(sender, conversationId, text) {
try {
const msg = new Message({
sender: sender,
conversationId: conversationId,
text: text
});
await msg.save();
console.log("Done");
} catch (e) {
console.log("An error happened while logging the message: " + e)
}
}
Now, I have another async function that gets triggered when I receive a message and takes care of processing it and fetching some data.
As soon as this function get triggered I call "log_message" to log the message on my database, but I do not want to call it with await, otherwise, I would wait until the "log_message" function returns before processing the message slowing down the message processing.
async getReply(username, message) {
log_message("user", username, message);
console.log("HI");
let reply = await this.rs.reply(username, message, this);
return reply;
}
Nevertheless, Jetbrains Webstorm gives me this warning "Missing await for an async function call".
Now, I did some tests and if I call the function without await the system behaves as I expect, the message gets processed and my logging function writes the data on the db asynchronously without interrupting.
If instead, I put the await keyword before calling the logging function the execution of the code in the main function gets suspended until the db has not been written.
Could someone tell me whether there are some flaws in the way I intended the usage of the async/await keywords?
It is not necessary if your logic doesn't require the result of the async call. Although not needed in your case, the documentation lists two benefits to having that warning enabled:
While this is generally not necessary, it gives two main benefits.
The first one is that you won't forget to add 'await' when surrounding your code with try-catch.
The second one is that having explicit 'await' helps V8 runtime to provide async stack traces
When you set async to a method, the method expects to use await inside its scope. Because the functionality of async keyword is like if you were telling to the method that inside its scope there's another process which must be completed before can proceed to the method process.
In other words, if you don't want to await to some other process to finish, then you should avoid async keyword in your method.
Here, makes sense the await keyword:
await msg.save();
Because it awaits till it's saved before log that is Done. But in the methods you want all run without waiting for other processes to end. Just don't use asyn keyword. If you don't want to await here:
await this.rs.reply(username, message, this);
Don't use async here:
async getReply(username, message)
If you need to await something in getReply then you should add async keyword, otherwise, is not necessary the keyword.
Whenever you want to await some operation you have to associate await with that but before associate await with that you need to make parent function async.
Though I see you have answers here.
Let me tell you the thing now!
Async functions are not necessarily required to have an await call inside it, but the reason behind making a function async is that you need an asynchronous call for which you want to wait for the result before moving forward in the thread.
async getReply(username, message) {
log_message("user", username, message);
console.log("HI");
let reply = await this.rs.reply(username, message, this);
return reply;
}
The above function will work, but why exactly would you make it async? Since you aren't using any asynchronous functionality. It works the same if used as following:-
getReply(username, message) {
log_message("user", username, message);
console.log("HI");
let reply = await this.rs.reply(username, message, this);
return reply;
}
Related
I would like to run this code with babel:
redisClientAsync.delAsync('key');
return await someOtherAsyncFunction();
inside an async function without await the first line. is this OK?
how else can I run something that I don't care?
Can I just fire the non-promisified function del('key',null) without a callback?
Yes, you can do that, and it will run the two asynchronous functions in parallel. You've just created a promise and thrown it away.
However, this means that when the promise is rejected you won't notice. You'll just get an unhandledRejection eventually which will crash your process if not handled.
Is this OK? How can I run something that I don't care?
Probably it's not OK. If you truly wouldn't care, you hadn't run it in the first place. So you should be clear and explicit what you care about (and what not):
do you want to wait? (for side effects)
do you need the result?
do you want to catch exceptions?
If you only want to wait and don't care for the result value, you can easily throw away the result:
void (await someAsyncFunction()); // or omit the void keyword,
// doesn't make a difference in an expression statement
If you don't care about exceptions, you can ignore them using
… someAsyncFunction().catch(function ignore() {}) …
You can throw that away, await it, do anything with it.
If you want the result, you have to await it. If you care about exceptions, but don't really want to wait, you may want to execute it in parallel with the following functions:
var [_, res] = await Promise.all([
someAsyncFunction(), // result is ignored, exceptions aren't
someOtherAsyncFunction()
]);
return res;
inside an async function without await the first line. is this OK?
Yes, there are cases where you'd want to do this which are perfectly reasonable. Especially where you don't care about the result - one example is an analytics tracking operation that should not interfere with business critical code.
how else can I run something that I don't care?
In many ways, however simply calling the promise function works. Your del without a callback would probably work in this case but some functions don't guard against not passing callbacks, so you can pass an empty function instead (.del('key', () => {})).
You do want to however make sure that you know about it failing, even if you don't want to disrupt the operation of code - so please consider adding a process.on("unhandledRejection', event handler to explicitly ignore these particular exceptions or suppress them via:
redisClient.delAsync('key').catch(()=>{});
Or preferably, something like:
redisClient.delAsync('key').catch(logErr);
From all the research I've made so far, I think it's fine to do it, as long as you guarantee that the function you are not awaiting for guarantees a way to handle its own errors in case that happens. For example, a try-catch wrapping the whole function body, like you see in the following snippet for the asyncFunction.
It doesn't matter if the function throws synchronously or asynchronously. It guarantees the your mainFunction will complete no matter what. That's the key point here.
If you don't guarantee that, you have to risks:
If it throws synchronously, your main function will not complete.
If it throws asynchronously, you'll get an unhandled excepction
// THIS IS SOME API CALL YOU DON'T WANT TO WAIT FOR
const mockAPI = () => {
console.log("From mockAPI");
return new Promise((resolve,reject) => {
setTimeout(() => reject("LATE THROW: API ERROR"), 500);
});
};
// THIS IS THE SOME ASYNC FUNCTION YOU CALL BUT NOT AWAIT FOR
const asyncFunction = async (syncThrow) => {
try {
console.log("Async function START");
if (syncThrow) throw new Error("EARLY THROW");
await mockAPI();
console.log("Async function DONE");
}
catch(err) {
console.log("From async function catch");
console.log(err.message || err);
return;
}
};
// THIS IS YOUR MAIN FUNCTION
const mainFunction = async (syncThrow) => {
try {
console.clear();
console.log("Main function START");
asyncFunction(syncThrow);
console.log("Main function DONE <<< THAT'S THE IMPORTANT PART");
}
catch(err) {
console.log("THIS WILL NEVER HAPPEN");
console.log(err);
}
};
<div>
<button onClick="mainFunction(true)">Sync throw</button>
<button onClick="mainFunction(false)">Async throw</button>
</div>
Not in Node.js.
Node does not wait for ever-pending Promises. If other tasks are already completed and there is nothing left in the event loop, the Node process will be terminated even though there exists pending promise.
For the following script, if someOtherAsyncFunction() get resolved in 5 seconds, but redisClientAsync.delAsync('key') takes 10 seconds to execute, the Node process will be terminated after 5 seconds in theory, before the first line is resolved.
async function doSomething() {
redisClientAsync.delAsync('key');
return await someOtherAsyncFunction();
}
await doSomething();
To my understanding, the point behind await is to 'await' the acting upon the resolved value of a promise until it is encountered as a microtask, as Jake Archibald explains here.
This video by LLJS shows that async-await is essentially syntactical sugar for a generator runner/interpreter function that yields where it awaits and passes the settled value of the promise to the .next() method. This means that the runner's execution of .next() is enqueued as a microtask when an await occurs.
Effectively speaking, all the code under that await will only be executed at the next microtask checkpoint. This can be an issue if code that doesn't require the awaited value of the promise lies underneath it, which is exactly the issue with Async IIFEs.
async function ping() {
for (let i = 0; i < 5; i++) {
let result = await Promise.resolve("ping");
console.log(result);
}
console.log("Why am I even here?");
}
async function pong() {
for (let i = 0; i < 5; i++) {
let result = await Promise.resolve("pong");
console.log(result);
}
console.log("I have nothing to do with any of this");
}
console.log("Let the games begin!");
ping();
pong();
console.log("Placeholder for code that is not related to ping pong");
In this example, the outside logs are logged first as part of the task of running the script, then the values of the resolved promises in the order that they were queued in the microtask queue. Within this entire process, the logs left underneath the for loops have nothing to do with the loops and are needlessly paused until the last microtask in their respective function bodies is out of the queue.
This is exactly what happens when we use async functions as IIFEs though. If you have code under the await that is meant to execute synchronously, it would have to needlessly wait until all the awaits above it have been checked out of the microtask queue.
I can see this being a problem if someone blindly wraps their entire express routes in async functions, where they would needlessly await the resolving of certain promises like database operations, the sending of emails, reading of files, etc..., So why do people still do this?
app.post('/forgotPwd', async (req, res) => {
const {email, username} = req.body;
if (!email) {
res.status(400).json({error: "No username entered"});
return;
}
if (!username) {
res.status(400).json({error: "No email entered"});
return;
}
const db = client.db();
const user = await db.collection("Users").findOne({username: username, "userInfo.email": email});
if (!user) {
res.status(400).json({error: "Account not found"});
return;
}
const authToken = await getAuthToken({id: user._id.toHexString()}, "15m");
// Would probably send a more verbose email
await sgMail.send({
from: process.env.EMAIL,
to: email,
subject: 'Forgot Password',
text: `Use this url to reset your password: http://localhost:5000/confirmation/passConf/${authToken}`,
});
res.json({error: ""});
});
If you want something in an async function to run synchronously, make sure it's prior to the first await in the function.
So why do people still do this?
That's probably an off-topic question for SO since it largely calls for opinion-based answers, but it's likely going to be either A) Because they don't want that code to run until the code above it has finished, or B) Because they don't understand async functions.
The point of using async/await is to make asynchronous code look synchronous because it's easier to read. In fact, it is a syntactic sugar that hides a callback hell underneath. You don't need to deal with callbacks in order to handle async operations.
In your case, if you think that the code after the for loop has nothing to do with the awaited operation, you shouldn't have place it after await. Or you should refactor the code so that it does not use await (callbacks).
As for the question of why people do this. Well, can you tell why people use .map() as a replacement of .forEach()? Or can you tell why they don't handle exceptions? They probably don't fully understand it or (as T.J. Crowder mentioned) they do want the code to run after the awaited operation. Simple as that.
I would like to run this code with babel:
redisClientAsync.delAsync('key');
return await someOtherAsyncFunction();
inside an async function without await the first line. is this OK?
how else can I run something that I don't care?
Can I just fire the non-promisified function del('key',null) without a callback?
Yes, you can do that, and it will run the two asynchronous functions in parallel. You've just created a promise and thrown it away.
However, this means that when the promise is rejected you won't notice. You'll just get an unhandledRejection eventually which will crash your process if not handled.
Is this OK? How can I run something that I don't care?
Probably it's not OK. If you truly wouldn't care, you hadn't run it in the first place. So you should be clear and explicit what you care about (and what not):
do you want to wait? (for side effects)
do you need the result?
do you want to catch exceptions?
If you only want to wait and don't care for the result value, you can easily throw away the result:
void (await someAsyncFunction()); // or omit the void keyword,
// doesn't make a difference in an expression statement
If you don't care about exceptions, you can ignore them using
… someAsyncFunction().catch(function ignore() {}) …
You can throw that away, await it, do anything with it.
If you want the result, you have to await it. If you care about exceptions, but don't really want to wait, you may want to execute it in parallel with the following functions:
var [_, res] = await Promise.all([
someAsyncFunction(), // result is ignored, exceptions aren't
someOtherAsyncFunction()
]);
return res;
inside an async function without await the first line. is this OK?
Yes, there are cases where you'd want to do this which are perfectly reasonable. Especially where you don't care about the result - one example is an analytics tracking operation that should not interfere with business critical code.
how else can I run something that I don't care?
In many ways, however simply calling the promise function works. Your del without a callback would probably work in this case but some functions don't guard against not passing callbacks, so you can pass an empty function instead (.del('key', () => {})).
You do want to however make sure that you know about it failing, even if you don't want to disrupt the operation of code - so please consider adding a process.on("unhandledRejection', event handler to explicitly ignore these particular exceptions or suppress them via:
redisClient.delAsync('key').catch(()=>{});
Or preferably, something like:
redisClient.delAsync('key').catch(logErr);
From all the research I've made so far, I think it's fine to do it, as long as you guarantee that the function you are not awaiting for guarantees a way to handle its own errors in case that happens. For example, a try-catch wrapping the whole function body, like you see in the following snippet for the asyncFunction.
It doesn't matter if the function throws synchronously or asynchronously. It guarantees the your mainFunction will complete no matter what. That's the key point here.
If you don't guarantee that, you have to risks:
If it throws synchronously, your main function will not complete.
If it throws asynchronously, you'll get an unhandled excepction
// THIS IS SOME API CALL YOU DON'T WANT TO WAIT FOR
const mockAPI = () => {
console.log("From mockAPI");
return new Promise((resolve,reject) => {
setTimeout(() => reject("LATE THROW: API ERROR"), 500);
});
};
// THIS IS THE SOME ASYNC FUNCTION YOU CALL BUT NOT AWAIT FOR
const asyncFunction = async (syncThrow) => {
try {
console.log("Async function START");
if (syncThrow) throw new Error("EARLY THROW");
await mockAPI();
console.log("Async function DONE");
}
catch(err) {
console.log("From async function catch");
console.log(err.message || err);
return;
}
};
// THIS IS YOUR MAIN FUNCTION
const mainFunction = async (syncThrow) => {
try {
console.clear();
console.log("Main function START");
asyncFunction(syncThrow);
console.log("Main function DONE <<< THAT'S THE IMPORTANT PART");
}
catch(err) {
console.log("THIS WILL NEVER HAPPEN");
console.log(err);
}
};
<div>
<button onClick="mainFunction(true)">Sync throw</button>
<button onClick="mainFunction(false)">Async throw</button>
</div>
Not in Node.js.
Node does not wait for ever-pending Promises. If other tasks are already completed and there is nothing left in the event loop, the Node process will be terminated even though there exists pending promise.
For the following script, if someOtherAsyncFunction() get resolved in 5 seconds, but redisClientAsync.delAsync('key') takes 10 seconds to execute, the Node process will be terminated after 5 seconds in theory, before the first line is resolved.
async function doSomething() {
redisClientAsync.delAsync('key');
return await someOtherAsyncFunction();
}
await doSomething();
I have a Vuex store and I am trying to fetch data from the Firebase Realtime Database. I am initially fetching the user information, however afterwards I would like to fetch some other information that relies upon the initial data fetched.
As you can see from the code, I am trying to do this using async / await, however whenever firing the two actions in my created() hook, the user's information isn't initialised, and therefore the second action fails.
My user store
async fetchCreds({ commit }) {
try {
firebase.auth().onAuthStateChanged(async function(user) {
const { uid } = user
const userDoc = await users.doc(uid).get()
return commit('SET_USER', userDoc.data())
})
} catch (error) {
console.log(error)
commit('SET_USER', {})
}
}
My club action which relies upon the above call
async fetchClubInformation({ commit, rootState }) {
try {
const clubIDForLoggedInUser = rootState.user.clubId
const clubDoc = await clubs.doc(clubIDForLoggedInUser).get()
return commit('SET_CLUB_INFO', clubDoc.data())
} catch (error) {
console.log(error)
}
}
}
The methods being called within my component's created() method.
created: async function() {
await this.fetchCreds();
await this.fetchClubInformation();
this.loading = false;
}
I have a feeling I'm fundamentally misunderstanding async / await, but I can't understand what in the code is incorrect - any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.
I'm not particularly familiar with Firebase but after a bit of digging through the source code I think I can shed a little light on your problems.
Firstly, consider the following example:
async function myFn (obj) {
obj.method(function () {
console.log('here 1')
})
console.log('here 2')
}
await myFn(x)
console.log('here 3')
Question: What order will you see the log messages?
Well here 2 will definitely come before here 3 but it's impossible to tell from the code above when here 1 will show up. It depends on what obj.method does with the function it's been passed. It might never call it at all. It might call it synchronously (e.g. Array's forEach method), in which case here 1 will appear before the other messages. If it's asynchronous (e.g. timers, server calls) then here 1 may not show up for some time, long after here 3.
The async modifier will implicitly return a Promise from the function if it doesn't return a Promise itself. The resolved value of that Promise will be the value returned from the function and the Promise will resolve at the point the function returns. For a function without a return at the end that's equivalent to it finishing with return undefined.
So, to stress the key point, the Promise returned by an async function will only wait until that function returns.
The method onAuthStateChanged calls its callback asynchronously, so the code in that callback won't run until after the surrounding function has completed. There's nothing to tell the implicitly returned Promise to wait for that callback to be invoked. The await inside the callback is irrelevant as that function hasn't even been called yet.
Firebase makes extensive use of Promises, so typically the solution would just be to return or await the relevant Promise:
// Note: This WON'T work, explanation follows
return firebase.auth().onAuthStateChanged(async function(user) {
// Note: This WON'T work, explanation follows
await firebase.auth().onAuthStateChanged(async function(user) {
This won't work here because onAuthStateChanged doesn't actually return a Promise, it returns an unsubscribe function.
You could, of course, create a new Promise yourself and 'fix' it that way. However, creating new Promises using new Promise is generally considered a code smell. Typically it's only necessary when wrapping code that doesn't support Promises properly. If we're working with a library that has proper Promise support (as we are here) then we shouldn't need to create any Promises.
So why doesn't onAuthStateChanged return a Promise?
Because it's a way of watching all sign-in/sign-out events. Every time the user signs in or signs out it'll call the callback. It isn't intended as a way to watch a particular sign-in. A Promise can only be resolved once, to a single value. So while a single sign-in event could be modelled with a Promise it's meaningless when watching all sign-in/sign-out events.
So fetchCreds is registering to be notified about all sign-in/sign-out events. It doesn't do anything with the returned unsubscribe function, so presumably it'll be listening to all such events until the page is reloaded. If you call fetchCreds multiple times it'll keep adding more and more listeners.
If you're waiting for a user to finish signing in then I suggest waiting for that directly instead. firebase.auth() has various methods starting with the prefix signIn, e.g. signInWithEmailAndPassword, and these do return a Promise that resolves when the user has finished signing in. The resolved value provides access to various information, including the user. I don't know which method you're using but the idea is much the same for all of them.
However, it might be that you're really just interested in grabbing the details of the current user. If that's all you want then you don't need to use onAuthStateChanged at all. You should just be able to grab a copy using the currentUser property. Something like this:
async fetchCreds({ commit }) {
try {
const { uid } = firebase.auth().currentUser
const userDoc = await users.doc(uid).get()
commit('SET_USER', userDoc.data())
} catch (error) {
console.log(error)
commit('SET_USER', {})
}
}
As I've already mentioned, this relies on the assumption that the user is already signed in. If that isn't a safe assumption then you might want to consider waiting until after sign in has completed before creating components that need user credentials.
Update:
Questions from the comments:
If the obj.method() call was asynchronous and we did await the callback function within it, would that ensure that the outer async function (myFn) never resolves before the inner one has finished?
I'm not entirely sure what you're asking here.
Just to be clear, I'm being very careful with my use of the words async and asynchronous. A function such as setTimeout would be considered asynchronous but it is not async.
async/await is just a lot of syntactic sugar around Promises. You don't really wait for a function, you wait for a Promise. When we talk about awaiting an async function we're really talking about waiting for the Promise it returns to resolve.
So when you say await the callback function it's not really clear what that means. Which Promise are you trying to await?
Putting the async modifier on a function doesn't make it magically wait for things. It will only wait when it encounters await. You can still have other asynchronous calls within an async function and, just like with a normal function, these calls will be performed after the function has returned. The only way to 'pause' is to await a Promise.
Putting an await inside another function, even a nested function, won't make any difference to whether the outer function waits unless the outer function is already waiting for the inner function. Behind the scenes this is all just Promises chaining then calls. Whenever you write await you're just adding another then call to a Promise. However, that won't have the desired effect unless that Promise is in the same chain as the Promise returned by the outer async function. It only needs one link to be missing for the chain to fail.
So modifying my earlier example:
async function myFn (obj) {
await obj.method(async function () {
await somePromise
// ...
})
// ...
}
await myFn(x)
Note that there are 3 functions here: myFn, method and the callback passed to method. The question is, will await myFn(x) wait for somePromise?
From the code above we can't actually tell. It would depend on what method does internally. For example, if method looked like this then it still wouldn't work:
function method (callback) {
setTimeout(callback, 1000)
}
Putting async on method won't help, that'll just make it return a Promise but the Promise still won't be waiting for the timer to fire.
Our Promise chain has a broken link. myFn and the callback are both creating their parts of the chain but unless method links those Promises together it won't work.
On the other hand, if method is written to return a suitable Promise that waits for the callback to complete then we will get our target behaviour:
function method (callback) {
return someServerCallThatReturnsAPromise().then(callback)
}
We could have used async/await here instead but there was no need as we can just return the Promise directly.
Also, if in the async myFn function you're not returning anything, does that mean it'll resolve immediately and as undefined?
The term immediately is not well-defined here.
If a function isn't returning anything at the end then it's equivalent to having return undefined at the end.
The Promise returned by an async function will resolve at the point the function returns.
The resolved value for the Promise will be the value returned.
So if you aren't returning anything it will resolve to undefined. Resolving won't happen until the end of the function is reached. If the function doesn't contain any await calls then this will happen 'immediately' in the same sense as a synchronous function returning 'immediately'.
However, await is just syntactic sugar around a then call, and then calls are always asynchronous. So while the Promise might resolve 'immediately' the await still has to wait. It's a very short wait, but it isn't synchronous and other code may get the opportunity to run in the meantime.
Consider the following:
const myFn = async function () {
console.log('here 3')
}
console.log('here 1')
Promise.resolve('hi').then(() => {
console.log('here 4')
})
console.log('here 2')
await myFn()
console.log('here 5')
The log messages will appear in the order they're numbered. So even though myFn resolves 'immediately' you'll still get here 4 jumping in between here 3 and here 5.
To make it short
fetchCreds({ commit }) {
return new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
try {
firebase.auth().onAuthStateChanged(async function(user) {
const { uid } = user
const userDoc = await users.doc(uid).get()
commit('SET_USER', userDoc.data())
resolve()
})
} catch (error) {
console.log(error)
commit('SET_USER', {})
resolve()
}}
}
async () => undefined // returns Promise<undefined> -> undefined resolves immediatly
asnyc () => func(cb) // returns Promise<any> resolves before callback got called
() => new Promise(resolve => func(() => resolve())) // resolves after callback got called
Could you please help me to understand javascirpt async hell?
I think I am missing something important ☹ The thing is that js examples and most of the answers on the internet are related to just one part of code – a small snippet. But applications are much more complicated.
I am not going write it directly in JS since I am more interested of the design and how to write it PROPERLY.
Imagine these functions in my application:
InsertTestData();
SelectDataFromDB_1(‘USERS’);
SelectDataFromDB_2(‘USER_CARS’,’USERS’);
FillCollections(‘USER’,’USER_CARS’);
DoTheWork();
DeleteData();
I did not provide any description for the functions but I think it is obvious based on names. They need to go in THIS SPECIFIC ORDER. Imagine that I need to run a select into the db to get USERS and then I need run a select to get USER_CARS for these USERS. So it must be really in this order (consider the same for other functions). The thing is that need to call 6 times Node/Mysql which is async but I need results in specific order. So how can I PROPERLY make that happen?
This could work:
/* not valid code I want to present the idea and keep it short */
InsertTestData(
Mysql.query(select, data, function(err,success)
{
SelectDataFromDB_1(‘USERS’); -- in that asyn function I will call the next procedure
}
));
SelectDataFromDB_1 (
Mysql.query(select, data, function(err,success)
{
SelectDataFromDB_2(‘USERS’); -- in that asyn function I will call the next procedure
}
));
SelectDataFromDB_2 (
Mysql.query(select, data, function(err,success)
{
FillCollections (‘USERS’); -- in that asyn function I will call the next procedure
}
));
etc..
I can “easily” chain it but this looks as a mess. I mean really mess.
I can use some scheduler/timmers to schedule and testing if the previous procedure is done)
Both of them are mess.
So, what is the proper way to do this;
Thank you,
AZOR
If you're using a recent version of Node, you can use ES2017's async/await syntax to have synchronous-looking code that's really asynchronous.
First, you need a version of Mysql.query that returns a promise, which is easily done with util.promisify:
const util = require('util');
// ...
const query = util.promisify(Mysql.query);
Then, wrap your code in an async function and use await:
(async () => {
try {
await InsertTestData();
await SelectDataFromDB_1(‘USERS’);
await SelectDataFromDB_2(‘USER_CARS’,’USERS’);
await FillCollections(‘USER’,’USER_CARS’);
await DoTheWork();
await DeleteData();
} catch (e) {
// Handle the fact an error occurred...
}
})();
...where your functions are async functions, e.g.:
async InsertTestData() {
await query("INSERT INTO ...");
}
Note the try/catch in the async wrapper, it's essential to handle errors, because otherwise if an error occurs you'll get an unhandled rejection notice (and future versions of Node may well terminate the process). (Why "unhandled rejections"? Because async functions are syntactic sugar for promises; an async function returns a promise.) You can either do that with the try/catch shown, or alternate by using .catch on the result of calling it:
(async () => {
await InsertTestData();
// ...
})().catch(e => {
// Handle the fact an error occurred
});