I've recently discovered the promises, and they made my life much easier.
But there is a specific case that I'm not being capable to handle. It is when I have to call a promise inside then().
Here is my code:
const firebaseAuth = require("firebase/auth");
const auth = firebaseAuth.getAuth();
const { User } = require('../models/User');
app.post('/create_user', (req, res) => {
user_uid = req.body.params.uid;
newUserEmail = req.body.params.email;
newUserPassword = req.body.params.password;
let user;
firebaseAuth.createUserWithEmailAndPassword(auth, newUserEmail, newUserPassword)
.then((userCredential) => new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
if(userCredential == undefined) throw Error("createUserWithEmailAndPassword failed");
user = new User(userCredential.user.uid, req.body.params.userAttributes);
resolve()
}))
.then(firebaseAuth.sendPasswordResetEmail(auth, user.attr.email, null))
.then(/*other functions using User object*/)
.then(() => { // finished promise chaining
res.status(200).send();
})
.catch((e) => {
console.log(e)
res.status(403).send();
})
});
The problem is, the .then(firebaseAuth.sendPasswordResetEmail(auth, user.attr.email, null)) is being called before the user is initialized in user = new User(userCredential.user.uid, req.body.params.userAttributes);.
Could someone please help me understand why is this happening? And in case I have to call a promise inside a then(), Do I also have to nest a .catch()? Or my single .catch() at the end of my function will be capable to handle possible errors?
Edit: User does some async tasks inside the constructor, because it has to handle the images.
And I can only Initialize it, after firebaseAuth.createUserWithEmailAndPassword(auth, newUserEmail, newUserPassword) because I have to get the generated Id in userCredential
I see two issues here:
The most simple fix for your code is to change this line:
.then(firebaseAuth.sendPasswordResetEmail(auth, user.attr.email, null))
to
.then(() => firebaseAuth.sendPasswordResetEmail(auth, user.attr.email, null))
notice the the the arrow function wrapping the call to firebaseAuth, before your code was the equivalent of asking firebaseAuth to return a function that would handle that step of the promise chain.
If the only purpose of return new Promise() is to do the validation and get the user, you can simply.
.then((userCredential) => {
if(userCredential == undefined) throw Error("createUserWithEmailAndPassword failed");
return new User(userCredential.user.uid, req.body.params.userAttributes);
})
and the user will be available in the next chain as
.then(user => {
// do stuff with user
})
You can use async function and try block to await the userCredential value like this:
app.post('/create_user', async(req, res) => {
user_uid = req.body.params.uid;
newUserEmail = req.body.params.email;
newUserPassword = req.body.params.password;
let user;
try {
const userCredential =
await firebaseAuth.createUserWithEmailAndPassword(
auth,
newUserEmail,
newUserPassword
);
if (userCredential == undefined)
return res
.status(400)
.send('❌ CreateUserWithEmailAndPassword failed 🙁');
user = new User(
userCredential.user.uid,
req.body.params.userAttributes
);
await firebaseAuth.sendPasswordResetEmail(auth, user.attr.email, null);
return res.status(201).send('Created!! 😀');
} catch (error) {
console.log('❌ Error:', error);
return res.status(400).json({
message: error,
});
}
});
We should never find new Promise() wrapping a library that already creates promises.
Also remember that the form of a chain is....
// promiseA, promiseB & promiseC are expressions that evaluate to promises
return promiseA.then(resolutionOfPromiseA => {
// synchronous work
return promiseB;
}).then(resolutionOfPromiseB => {
// synchronous work
return promiseC;
}).catch(error => {})
In newer syntax:
async function myFunction() {
try {
let resolutionOfPromiseA = await promiseA;
// synchronous work
let resolutionOfPromiseB = await promiseB;
// synchronous work
return promiseC;
} catch(error) {
}
Sticking with the OP's older syntactic style (which is perfectly good as long as it remains consistent)
let user;
firebaseAuth.createUserWithEmailAndPassword(auth, newUserEmail, newUserPassword)
.then(userCredential => {
// note that we don't create a promise
if(userCredential == undefined) throw Error("createUserWithEmailAndPassword failed");
user = new User(userCredential.user.uid, req.body.params.userAttributes);
// note that we return this one. It's good form, even if the next then doesn't use the result
return firebaseAuth.sendPasswordResetEmail(auth, user.attr.email, null)
})
.then(res => { // this res is the result of firebaseAuth.sendPasswordResetEmail
// user is in scope here because it's in the containing scope
/* other functions using User object */
})
.then(() => { // finished promise chaining
res.status(200).send();
})
.catch((e) => {
console.log(e)
res.status(403).send();
})
edit If you really wanted user in the block after sendPasswordReset, and you really didn't want to keep a user variable in the containing scope, you could say...
// move let declaration here
let user = new User(//...
// string an extra return user here
// some linters think this is a faux pas
return firebaseAuth.sendPasswordResetEmail(auth, user.attr.email, null)
.then(() => return user)
)}.then(user =>
I have an array of Promises that I'm resolving with Promise.all(arrayOfPromises);
I go on to continue the promise chain. Looks something like this
existingPromiseChain = existingPromiseChain.then(function() {
var arrayOfPromises = state.routes.map(function(route){
return route.handler.promiseHandler();
});
return Promise.all(arrayOfPromises)
});
existingPromiseChain = existingPromiseChain.then(function(arrayResolved) {
// do stuff with my array of resolved promises, eventually ending with a res.send();
});
I want to add a catch statement to handle an individual promise in case it errors, but when I try, Promise.all returns the first error it finds (disregards the rest), and then I can't get the data from the rest of the promises in the array (that didn't error).
I've tried doing something like ..
existingPromiseChain = existingPromiseChain.then(function() {
var arrayOfPromises = state.routes.map(function(route){
return route.handler.promiseHandler()
.then(function(data) {
return data;
})
.catch(function(err) {
return err
});
});
return Promise.all(arrayOfPromises)
});
existingPromiseChain = existingPromiseChain.then(function(arrayResolved) {
// do stuff with my array of resolved promises, eventually ending with a res.send();
});
But that doesn't resolve.
Thanks!
--
Edit:
What the answers below said were completely true, the code was breaking due to other reasons. In case anyone is interested, this is the solution I ended up with ...
Node Express Server Chain
serverSidePromiseChain
.then(function(AppRouter) {
var arrayOfPromises = state.routes.map(function(route) {
return route.async();
});
Promise.all(arrayOfPromises)
.catch(function(err) {
// log that I have an error, return the entire array;
console.log('A promise failed to resolve', err);
return arrayOfPromises;
})
.then(function(arrayOfPromises) {
// full array of resolved promises;
})
};
API Call (route.async call)
return async()
.then(function(result) {
// dispatch a success
return result;
})
.catch(function(err) {
// dispatch a failure and throw error
throw err;
});
Putting the .catch for Promise.all before the .then seems to have served the purpose of catching any errors from the original promises, but then returning the entire array to the next .then
Thanks!
Promise.all is all or nothing. It resolves once all promises in the array resolve, or reject as soon as one of them rejects. In other words, it either resolves with an array of all resolved values, or rejects with a single error.
Some libraries have something called Promise.when, which I understand would instead wait for all promises in the array to either resolve or reject, but I'm not familiar with it, and it's not in ES6.
Your code
I agree with others here that your fix should work. It should resolve with an array that may contain a mix of successful values and errors objects. It's unusual to pass error objects in the success-path but assuming your code is expecting them, I see no problem with it.
The only reason I can think of why it would "not resolve" is that it's failing in code you're not showing us and the reason you're not seeing any error message about this is because this promise chain is not terminated with a final catch (as far as what you're showing us anyway).
I've taken the liberty of factoring out the "existing chain" from your example and terminating the chain with a catch. This may not be right for you, but for people reading this, it's important to always either return or terminate chains, or potential errors, even coding errors, will get hidden (which is what I suspect happened here):
Promise.all(state.routes.map(function(route) {
return route.handler.promiseHandler().catch(function(err) {
return err;
});
}))
.then(function(arrayOfValuesOrErrors) {
// handling of my array containing values and/or errors.
})
.catch(function(err) {
console.log(err.message); // some coding error in handling happened
});
NEW ANSWER
const results = await Promise.all(promises.map(p => p.catch(e => e)));
const validResults = results.filter(result => !(result instanceof Error));
FUTURE Promise API
Chrome 76: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Promise/allSettled
You can download https://www.npmjs.com/package/promise.allsettled to get it now. In certain browsers allSettled comes preinstalled with the browser itself. It's worth downloading the package for peace of mind because eg. TypeScript doesn't have default definitions for allSettled.
ES2020 introduces new method for the Promise type: Promise.allSettled().
Promise.allSettled gives you a signal when all the input promises are settled, which means they’re either fulfilled or rejected. This is useful in cases where you don’t care about the state of the promise, you just want to know when the work is done, regardless of whether it was successful.
async function() {
const promises = [
fetch('/api.stackexchange.com/2.2'), // succeeds
fetch('/this-will-fail') // fails
];
const result = await Promise.allSettled(promises);
console.log(result.map(promise => promise.status));
// ['fulfilled', 'rejected']
}
Read more in the v8 blog post.
To continue the Promise.all loop (even when a Promise rejects) I wrote a utility function which is called executeAllPromises. This utility function returns an object with results and errors.
The idea is that all Promises you pass to executeAllPromises will be wrapped into a new Promise which will always resolve. The new Promise resolves with an array which has 2 spots. The first spot holds the resolving value (if any) and the second spot keeps the error (if the wrapped Promise rejects).
As a final step the executeAllPromises accumulates all values of the wrapped promises and returns the final object with an array for results and an array for errors.
Here is the code:
function executeAllPromises(promises) {
// Wrap all Promises in a Promise that will always "resolve"
var resolvingPromises = promises.map(function(promise) {
return new Promise(function(resolve) {
var payload = new Array(2);
promise.then(function(result) {
payload[0] = result;
})
.catch(function(error) {
payload[1] = error;
})
.then(function() {
/*
* The wrapped Promise returns an array:
* The first position in the array holds the result (if any)
* The second position in the array holds the error (if any)
*/
resolve(payload);
});
});
});
var errors = [];
var results = [];
// Execute all wrapped Promises
return Promise.all(resolvingPromises)
.then(function(items) {
items.forEach(function(payload) {
if (payload[1]) {
errors.push(payload[1]);
} else {
results.push(payload[0]);
}
});
return {
errors: errors,
results: results
};
});
}
var myPromises = [
Promise.resolve(1),
Promise.resolve(2),
Promise.reject(new Error('3')),
Promise.resolve(4),
Promise.reject(new Error('5'))
];
executeAllPromises(myPromises).then(function(items) {
// Result
var errors = items.errors.map(function(error) {
return error.message
}).join(',');
var results = items.results.join(',');
console.log(`Executed all ${myPromises.length} Promises:`);
console.log(`— ${items.results.length} Promises were successful: ${results}`);
console.log(`— ${items.errors.length} Promises failed: ${errors}`);
});
Promise.allSettled
Instead of Promise.all use Promise.allSettled which waits for all promises to settle, regardless of the result
let p1 = new Promise(resolve => resolve("result1"));
let p2 = new Promise( (resolve,reject) => reject('some troubles') );
let p3 = new Promise(resolve => resolve("result3"));
// It returns info about each promise status and value
Promise.allSettled([p1,p2,p3]).then(result=> console.log(result));
Polyfill
if (!Promise.allSettled) {
const rejectHandler = reason => ({ status: 'rejected', reason });
const resolveHandler = value => ({ status: 'fulfilled', value });
Promise.allSettled = function (promises) {
const convertedPromises = promises
.map(p => Promise.resolve(p).then(resolveHandler, rejectHandler));
return Promise.all(convertedPromises);
};
}
As #jib said,
Promise.all is all or nothing.
Though, you can control certain promises that are "allowed" to fail and we would like to proceed to .then.
For example.
Promise.all([
doMustAsyncTask1,
doMustAsyncTask2,
doOptionalAsyncTask
.catch(err => {
if( /* err non-critical */) {
return
}
// if critical then fail
throw err
})
])
.then(([ mustRes1, mustRes2, optionalRes ]) => {
// proceed to work with results
})
Using Async await -
here one async function func1 is returning a resolved value, and func2 is throwing a error and returning a null in this situation, we can handle it how we want and return accordingly.
const callingFunction = async () => {
const manyPromises = await Promise.all([func1(), func2()]);
console.log(manyPromises);
}
const func1 = async () => {
return 'func1'
}
const func2 = async () => {
try {
let x;
if (!x) throw "x value not present"
} catch(err) {
return null
}
}
callingFunction();
Output is - [ 'func1', null ]
if you get to use the q library https://github.com/kriskowal/q
it has q.allSettled() method that can solve this problem
you can handle every promise depending on its state either fullfiled or rejected
so
existingPromiseChain = existingPromiseChain.then(function() {
var arrayOfPromises = state.routes.map(function(route){
return route.handler.promiseHandler();
});
return q.allSettled(arrayOfPromises)
});
existingPromiseChain = existingPromiseChain.then(function(arrayResolved) {
//so here you have all your promises the fulfilled and the rejected ones
// you can check the state of each promise
arrayResolved.forEach(function(item){
if(item.state === 'fulfilled'){ // 'rejected' for rejected promises
//do somthing
} else {
// do something else
}
})
// do stuff with my array of resolved promises, eventually ending with a res.send();
});
For those using ES8 that stumble here, you can do something like the following, using async functions:
var arrayOfPromises = state.routes.map(async function(route){
try {
return await route.handler.promiseHandler();
} catch(e) {
// Do something to handle the error.
// Errored promises will return whatever you return here (undefined if you don't return anything).
}
});
var resolvedPromises = await Promise.all(arrayOfPromises);
Promise.allSettled with a filter
const promises = [
fetch('/api-call-1'),
fetch('/api-call-2'),
fetch('/api-call-3'),
];
// Imagine some of these requests fail, and some succeed.
const resultFilter = (result, error) => result.filter(i => i.status === (!error ? 'fulfilled' : 'rejected')).map(i => (!error ? i.value : i.reason));
const result = await Promise.allSettled(promises);
const fulfilled = resultFilter(result); // all fulfilled results
const rejected = resultFilter(result, true); // all rejected results
Have you considered Promise.prototype.finally()?
It seems to be designed to do exactly what you want - execute a function once all the promises have settled (resolved/rejected), regardless of some of the promises being rejected.
From the MDN documentation:
The finally() method can be useful if you want to do some processing or cleanup once the promise is settled, regardless of its outcome.
The finally() method is very similar to calling .then(onFinally, onFinally) however there are couple of differences:
When creating a function inline, you can pass it once, instead of being forced to either declare it twice, or create a variable for it.
A finally callback will not receive any argument, since there's no reliable means of determining if the promise was fulfilled or rejected. This use case is for precisely when you do not care about the rejection reason, or the fulfillment value, and so there's no need to provide it.
Unlike Promise.resolve(2).then(() => {}, () => {}) (which will be resolved with undefined), Promise.resolve(2).finally(() => {}) will be resolved with 2.
Similarly, unlike Promise.reject(3).then(() => {}, () => {}) (which will be fulfilled with undefined), Promise.reject(3).finally(() => {}) will be rejected with 3.
== Fallback ==
If your version of JavaScript doesn't support Promise.prototype.finally() you can use this workaround from Jake Archibald: Promise.all(promises.map(p => p.catch(() => undefined)));
We can handle the rejection at the individual promises level, so when we get the results in our result array, the array index which has been rejected will be undefined. We can handle that situation as needed, and use the remaining results.
Here I have rejected the first promise, so it comes as undefined, but we can use the result of the second promise, which is at index 1.
const manyPromises = Promise.all([func1(), func2()]).then(result => {
console.log(result[0]); // undefined
console.log(result[1]); // func2
});
function func1() {
return new Promise( (res, rej) => rej('func1')).catch(err => {
console.log('error handled', err);
});
}
function func2() {
return new Promise( (res, rej) => setTimeout(() => res('func2'), 500) );
}
const promise1 = Promise.resolve(3);
const promise2 = new Promise((resolve, reject) => setTimeout(reject, 100, 'foo'));
const promises = [promise1, promise2];
let sum = 0;
let promiseErrorArr = [];
Promise.allSettled(promises)
.then((results) => {
results.forEach(result => {
if (result.status === "rejected") {
sum += 1;
promiseErrorArr.push(result)
}
})
return ( (sum>0) ? promiseFailed() : promisePassed())
})
function promiseFailed(){
console.log('one or all failed!')
console.log(promiseErrorArr)
}
function promisePassed(){
console.log('all passed!')
}
// expected output:
// "one or all failed!"
// Array [Object { status: "rejected", reason: "foo" }]
Alternately, if you have a case where you don't particularly care about the values of the resolved promises when there is one failure but you still want them to have run, you could do something like this which will resolve with the promises as normal when they all succeed and reject with the failed promises when any of them fail:
function promiseNoReallyAll (promises) {
return new Promise(
async (resolve, reject) => {
const failedPromises = []
const successfulPromises = await Promise.all(
promises.map(
promise => promise.catch(error => {
failedPromises.push(error)
})
)
)
if (failedPromises.length) {
reject(failedPromises)
} else {
resolve(successfulPromises)
}
}
)
}
You can always wrap your promise returning functions in a way that they catches failure and returning instead an agreed value (e.g. error.message), so the exception won't roll all the way up to the Promise.all function and disable it.
async function resetCache(ip) {
try {
const response = await axios.get(`http://${ip}/resetcache`);
return response;
}catch (e) {
return {status: 'failure', reason: 'e.message'};
}
}
I've found a way (workaround) to do this without making it sync.
So as it was mentioned before Promise.all is all of none.
so... Use an enclosing promise to catch and force resolve.
let safePromises = originalPrmises.map((imageObject) => {
return new Promise((resolve) => {
// Do something error friendly
promise.then(_res => resolve(res)).catch(_err => resolve(err))
})
})
})
// safe
return Promise.all(safePromises)
You would need to know how to identify an error in your results. If you do not have a standard expected error, I suggest that you run a transformation on each error in the catch block that makes it identifiable in your results.
try {
let resArray = await Promise.all(
state.routes.map(route => route.handler.promiseHandler().catch(e => e))
);
// in catch(e => e) you can transform your error to a type or object
// that makes it easier for you to identify whats an error in resArray
// e.g. if you expect your err objects to have e.type, you can filter
// all errors in the array eg
// let errResponse = resArray.filter(d => d && d.type === '<expected type>')
// let notNullResponse = resArray.filter(d => d)
} catch (err) {
// code related errors
}
Not the best way to error log, but you can always set everything to an array for the promiseAll, and store the resulting results into new variables.
If you use graphQL you need to postprocess the response regardless and if it doesn't find the correct reference it'll crash the app, narrowing down where the problem is at
const results = await Promise.all([
this.props.client.query({
query: GET_SPECIAL_DATES,
}),
this.props.client.query({
query: GET_SPECIAL_DATE_TYPES,
}),
this.props.client.query({
query: GET_ORDER_DATES,
}),
]).catch(e=>console.log(e,"error"));
const specialDates = results[0].data.specialDates;
const specialDateTypes = results[1].data.specialDateTypes;
const orderDates = results[2].data.orders;
Unfortunately, I don't have enough reputation to comment (or do much of anything, really), so I'm posting this as an answer in response to Eric's answer here.
The executor function can also be an async function. However, this is usually a mistake, for a few reasons:
If an async executor function throws an error, the error will be lost and won’t cause the newly-constructed Promise to reject. This could make it difficult to debug and handle some errors.
If a Promise executor function is using await, this is usually a sign that it is not actually necessary to use the new Promise constructor, or the scope of the new Promise constructor can be reduced.
From this explanation as to why Promises should not utilize an async executor function
Instead, you should opt for Promise.allSettled(), as suggested here by Asaf.
With the help of allSettled,we can now read the status of
each promise is, and process each error individually, without losing any of this critical information
const promises = [
fetch('/api/first'), // first
fetch('/api/second') // second
];
The simplest way is to handle errors
const [firstResult, secondResult] = await Promise.allSettled(promises)
// Process first
if (firstResult.status === 'rejected') {
const err = firstResult.reason
// Here you can handle error
} else {
const first = firstResult.value
}
// Process second
if (secondResult.status === 'rejected') {
const err = secondResult.reason
// Here you can handle error
} else {
const second = secondResult.value
}
A nice way to handle error
const results = await Promise.allSettled(promises);
const [first, second] = handleResults(results)
function handleResults(results) {
const errors = results.filter(result => result.status === 'rejected').map(result => result.reason)
if (errors.length) {
// Aggregate all errors into one
throw new AggregateError(errors)
}
return results.map(result => result.value)
}
That's how Promise.all is designed to work. If a single promise reject()'s, the entire method immediately fails.
There are use cases where one might want to have the Promise.all allowing for promises to fail. To make this happen, simply don't use any reject() statements in your promise. However, to ensure your app/script does not freeze in case any single underlying promise never gets a response, you need to put a timeout on it.
function getThing(uid,branch){
return new Promise(function (resolve, reject) {
xhr.get().then(function(res) {
if (res) {
resolve(res);
}
else {
resolve(null);
}
setTimeout(function(){reject('timeout')},10000)
}).catch(function(error) {
resolve(null);
});
});
}
I wrote a npm library to deal with this problem more beautiful.
https://github.com/wenshin/promiseallend
Install
npm i --save promiseallend
2017-02-25 new api, it's not break promise principles
const promiseAllEnd = require('promiseallend');
const promises = [Promise.resolve(1), Promise.reject('error'), Promise.resolve(2)];
const promisesObj = {k1: Promise.resolve(1), k2: Promise.reject('error'), k3: Promise.resolve(2)};
// input promises with array
promiseAllEnd(promises, {
unhandledRejection(error, index) {
// error is the original error which is 'error'.
// index is the index of array, it's a number.
console.log(error, index);
}
})
// will call, data is `[1, undefined, 2]`
.then(data => console.log(data))
// won't call
.catch(error => console.log(error.detail))
// input promises with object
promiseAllEnd(promisesObj, {
unhandledRejection(error, prop) {
// error is the original error.
// key is the property of object.
console.log(error, prop);
}
})
// will call, data is `{k1: 1, k3: 2}`
.then(data => console.log(data))
// won't call
.catch(error => console.log(error.detail))
// the same to `Promise.all`
promiseAllEnd(promises, {requireConfig: true})
// will call, `error.detail` is 'error', `error.key` is number 1.
.catch(error => console.log(error.detail))
// requireConfig is Array
promiseAllEnd(promises, {requireConfig: [false, true, false]})
// won't call
.then(data => console.log(data))
// will call, `error.detail` is 'error', `error.key` is number 1.
.catch(error => console.log(error.detail))
// requireConfig is Array
promiseAllEnd(promises, {requireConfig: [true, false, false]})
// will call, data is `[1, undefined, 2]`.
.then(data => console.log(data))
// won't call
.catch(error => console.log(error.detail))
————————————————————————————————
Old bad api, do not use it!
let promiseAllEnd = require('promiseallend');
// input promises with array
promiseAllEnd([Promise.resolve(1), Promise.reject('error'), Promise.resolve(2)])
.then(data => console.log(data)) // [1, undefined, 2]
.catch(error => console.log(error.errorsByKey)) // {1: 'error'}
// input promises with object
promiseAllEnd({k1: Promise.resolve(1), k2: Promise.reject('error'), k3: Promise.resolve(2)})
.then(data => console.log(data)) // {k1: 1, k3: 2}
.catch(error => console.log(error.errorsByKey)) // {k2: 'error'}
CertainPerformance highlighted in my previous post advised me to avoid the explicit Promise construction antipattern with reference to to following question in stackoverflow
Frankly, Speaking, I am new to JS and node and I haven't used promise a lot. I went and read those article but either I was unable to comprehend or unable to relate or maybe somewhere my understanding of promises have been vague/wrong all together
So I decided to ask this question in a new thread and seek for help.
So what am I doing and why am I doing it
I am creating helper/common function which I could use to keep my code tidy and if in case I want to change anything inside function at anytime, I don't have to manually change every function.
So these are the functions I have made
//Find user by email Address
const findUserByEmail = (emailAddress) => {
return new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
User.findOne({email: emailAddress}).then(response => {
resolve(res)
}).catch(error => {
reject("Error in findUserByEmail", error);
})
})
}
//Create User
const createNewUser = (newUserDetails) => {
return new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
new User({
fullName: newUserDetails.fullName,
email: newUserDetails.email,
image: newUserDetails.image,
gender: newUserDetails.gender,
age: newUserDetails.age
}).save().then((response) => {
resolve(response)
}).catch((error) => {
reject("Problem in Creating New User", error)
})
})
}
Question 1
Now, I am assuming CertainPerformance said the excessive use of promises because I am creating new promise return new Promise((resolve, reject) => { when I am already using promises with mongoose User.findOne({email: emailAddress}).then(response => { ?
But the reason for me to create those promise was, when I call these helper function from anywhere in my app after importing
const { findUserByEmail } = require("./my_db_query");
I would probably want it return a response or throw an error in case of error
findUserByEmail("test#example.com").then(/*...*/).catch(/*...*/);
If I change my above code snippet without adding new promise
function findUserByEmail (email) {
return User.findOne({email: email}).then(currentUser => currentUser).catch(error => error)
}
Question 2
Then I won't probably be able to .then and .catch in findUserByEmail("test#example.com")?
And In API route of App, where I would be calling the findUserByEmail("test#example.com") function, I would want to do something else if there is an error (which would be different for different case and hence I cannot use it in my helper function).
Question 3
Does, it make sense now for doing return new Promise((resolve, reject) => { instead of doing just one return User.findOne( or am I missing something?
Because .findOne already returns a Promise, there's no need to construct a new one with new Promise - instead, just chain onto the existing Promise chain with .then and .catch as needed. Such Promise chains can have any number of .thens and .catchs - just because you consume a Promise with one .then doesn't prevent you from using the same resolve value elsewhere. To illustrate:
makePromise()
.then((result) => {
console.log(result);
// Returning inside a `.then` will pass along the value to the next `.then`:
return result;
})
.then((result) => {
// this `result` will be the same as the one above
});
In other words - there's no need to construct a new Promise every time you want to be able to use another .then. So:
Then I won't probably be able to .then and .catch in findUserByEmail("test#example.com")
isn't correct - you can indeed chain onto the end of an existing Promise with as many .thens and .catches as you want.
Note that a .then which only returns its parameter and does nothing else (such as .then(currentUser => currentUser)) is superfluous - it won't do anything at all. Also note that a .catch will catch Promise rejections and resolve to a resolved Promise. So if you do
function findUserByEmail(email) {
return User.findOne({email: email})
.then(currentUser => currentUser)
.catch(error => error)
}
that catch means that callers of findUserByEmail will not be able to catch errors, because any possible errors were caught in findUserByEmail's catch. Usually, it's a good idea to allow errors to percolate up to the caller of the function, that way you could, for example:
someFunctionThatReturnsPromise('foobar')
.then((result) => {
// everything is normal, send the result
res.send(result);
})
.catch((err) => {
// there was an error, set response status code to 500:
res.status(500).send('there was an error');
})
So, unless your findUserByEmail or createNewUser helper functions need to do something specific when there's an error, it would probably be best just to return the Promise alone:
const findUserByEmail = email => User.findOne(email);
const createNewUser = newUserDetails => new User(newUserDetails).save();
If your helper functions do need to do something when there's an error, then to make sure that the error gets passed along properly to the caller of the function, I'd recommend either throwing the error inside the catch:
const findUserByEmail = email => User.findOne(email)
.catch((err) => {
// error handling - save error text somewhere, do a console.log, etc
throw err;
});
so that you can catch when something else calls findUserByEmail. Otherwise, if you do something like
const findUserByEmail = email => User.findOne(email)
.catch((err) => {
// do something with err
return err;
});
then the caller of findUserByEmail will have to check inside the .then if the result is actually an error, which is weird:
findUserByEmail('foo#bar.com')
.then((result) => {
if (result instanceof Error) {
// do something
} else {
// No errors
}
});
Better to throw the error in findUserByEmail's catch, so that the consumer of findUserByEmail can also .catch.
It never makes sense to create a promise with promise constructor when there's existing promise, that's why it's called promise construction antipattern.
This is a mistake, reject("Error in findUserByEmail", error). reject accepts only 1
argument, which is rejection reason. error will be ignored. It's conventionanl for an error to be Error object and not a string.
The function may be refactored to:
const findUserByEmail = (emailAddress) => {
return User.findOne({email: emailAddress})
.then(response => response) // noop
.catch(error => {
const readableError = new Error('Error in findUserByEmail');
readableError.originalError = error;
throw readableError;
});
})
}
etc.
Antipatterns don't necessary result in bad performance but they result in code smell. They make the code harder to read, maintain and test, also show that a developer may have a poor understanding of the subject.
Promise constructor has some insignificant performance impact. It introduces another level of nesting and contributes to callback hell - promises are supposed to help avoiding it.
If I change my above code snippet without adding new promise <...>
Then I won't probably be able to .then and .catch in findUserByEmail("test#example.com")?
No, a promise can be chained with then(...) and catch(...) (which is syntactic sugar for then(null, ...)) as many times as needed, that's the strong side of the pattern. Notice that catch(err => { return err }) and catch(err => { throw err }) is not the same thing, the former catches an error, the latter rethrows it.