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dynamodb-data-types

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Readme

DynamoDb-Data-Types

A utility for Amazon DynamoDB data types.

This utility is designed to be used along with the Amazon SDK for Node.js. It helps represent AWS DynamoDb data types.

DynamoDB data types: docs.aws.amazon.com/amazondynamodb/latest/APIReference/API_Types.html

How is it useful?

Following are some key-value pairs:

var data = { 
    name: 'Java Script',
    age: 18, 
    engines: [ 'Rhino', 'v8', 'SpiderMonkey', 'Carakan', 'JavaScriptCore' ]
}

In order to put the above data into DynamoDB, the AWS SDK requires it to be represented as:

{ 
    name: { S: 'Java Script' },
    age: { N: '18' },
    engines: { SS: [ 'Rhino','v8','SpiderMonkey','Carakan','JavaScriptCore' ] }
}

This utility helps to construct such representations required by the AWS SDK for Node.js

To represent the above var data as a DynamoDB AttributeValue do:

var attr = require('dynamodb-data-types').AttributeValue;
attr.wrap(data);
// { 
//   name: { S: 'Java Script' },
//   age: { N: '18' },
//   engines: { SS: [ 'Rhino','v8','SpiderMonkey','Carakan','JavaScriptCore' ] }
// }

Quick Examples

var attr = require('dynamodb-data-types').AttributeValue;

var infoAttrValue = attr.wrap({ name: "Foo", age: 50 });
console.log(JSON.stringify(infoAttrValue));
// {"name":{"S":"Foo"},"age":{"N":"50"}}

var experience = {
  count: {"N": "4" },
  languages: { "SS": ["Java Script", "Ruby", "GLSL", "C" ] }
}
console.log(JSON.stringify(attr.unwrap(experience)));
// {"count":4,"languages":["Java Script","Ruby","GLSL","C"]}

More examples

examples/01-put-update.js

Features

The current version supports the following data types:

AttributeValue
AttributeValueUpdate

DynamoDB data types: docs.aws.amazon.com/amazondynamodb/latest/APIReference/API_Types.html

Unsupported types

Data types B / BS are unsupported in DynamoDb-Data-Types version 1.0.0. Wrapping / unwrapping B and BS will not work when used with AWS SDK 1.x.x but should automagically work with AWS SDK 2.x.x. This is related to automatic conversion of base64 done by AWS SDK version 2.x. See AWS Upgrading Notes (1.x to 2.0).

Use of B and BS data types are not tested in DynamoDb-Data-Types 1.0.0

B and BS will be tested in the upcoming DynamoDb-Data-Types 2.0.0

Download

The source is available for download from github.com/kayomarz/dynamodb-data-types.

To install using Node Package Manager (npm):

npm install dynamodb-data-types

Documentation

AttributeValue

AWS API Reference - AttributeValue

wrap
unwrap
wrap1
unwrap1

AttributeValueUpdate

AWS API Reference - AttributeValueUpdate

put
add
delete

AttributeValue

wrap(item)

Wrap object properties into DynamoDB's AttributeValue data type.

Arguments

@param {Object} item The object to wrap.
@return {Object} A DynamoDb AttributeValue.

Example

var attr = require('dynamodb-data-types').AttributeValue;
attr.wrap({name: "Foo", age: 50});
// {"name":{"S":"Foo"},"age":{"N":"50"}}

unwrap(attributeValue)

Unwrap DynamoDB AttributeValue to values of the appropriate types.

Arguments

@param {Object} attributeValue The DynamoDb AttributeValue to unwrap.
@return {Object} Unwrapped object with properties.

Example

var attr = require('dynamodb-data-types').AttributeValue;
attr.unwrap({"name":{"S":"Foo"},"age":{"N":"50"}});
// {name: "Foo", age: 50}

wrap1(value)

Wrap a single value into DynamoDB's AttributeValue.

Arguments

@param {String|Number|Array}
@return {Object} DynamoDB AttributeValue.

Example

var attr = require('dynamodb-data-types').AttributeValue;
attr.wrap1(50);    // {"N":"50"}
attr.wrap1("50");  // {"S":"50"}

unwrap1(attributeValue)

Unwrap a single DynamoDB's AttributeValue to a value of the appropriate javascript type.

Arguments

@param {Object} attributeValue The DynamoDB AttributeValue. @return {String|Number|Array} The javascript value.

Example

var attr = require('dynamodb-data-types').AttributeValue;
attr.unwrap1({"N":"50"});  // 50
attr.unwrap1({"S":"50"});  // "50"

AttributeValueUpdate

add(attrs)

Append attributes to be updated with action "ADD". This function can be chained with further calls to add, put or delete.

Arguments

@param {Object} attrs Object with attributes to be updated.
@return {Updates} Object with all update attributes in the chain.

Example - put, add, delete.

See note: duplicate attribute names

put(attrs)

Append attributes to be updated with action "PUT". This function can be chained with further calls to add, put or delete.

Arguments

@param {Object} attrs Object with attributes to be updated.
@return {Updates} Object with all update attributes in the chain.

Example - put, add, delete.

See note: duplicate attribute names

delete(attrs)

Append attributes to be updated with action "DELETE". This function can be chained with further calls to add, put or delete.

Arguments

@param {Object|String|Array} attrs If this argument is an an Object,the Object's property values must be an array, containing elements to be removed, as required by DynamoDb SDK. If this argument is a String, it should contain comma seperated names of properties to be deleted. If its an Array, each array element should be a property name to be deleted.
@return {Updates} Object with all update attributes in the chain.

See note: duplicate attribute names

### Example: `put`, `add`, `delete`

var attrUpdate = require('dynamodb-data-types').AttributeValueUpdate;

var dataUpdate = attrUpdate
    .put({name: "foo"})
    .add({age: 1})
    .delete("height, nickname")
    .add({favColors: ["red"]})
    .delete({favNumbers: [3]});

console.log(JSON.stringify(dataUpdate));
// {
//   "name": { "Action": "PUT", "Value": { "S": "foo" } },
//   "age": { "Action": "ADD", "Value": { "N": "1" } },
//   "height": { "Action": "DELETE" },
//   "nickname": { "Action": "DELETE" },
//   "favColors": { "Action": "ADD", "Value": { "SS": ["red" ] } },
//   "favNumbers": { "Action": "DELETE", "Value": { "NS": ["3"] } }
// }

### Note: Duplicate attribute names in `AttributeValueUpdate`

Each attribute name can appear only once in the AttributeUpdates object of the itemUpdate call. This is a feature of the AWS API. However its easy to overlook this when chaining add, put and delete updates.

For example, following is an attribute colors of type SS (String set)

var item = {
    id: ...,
    colors: ["red", "blue"]
}

Suppose, we want to delete "red" and add "orange".

To add "orange", the AttributeUpdates object is created as: attrUpdate.add({colors: ["orange"]}). Similarly, to delete "red" the AttributeUpdates object is created as attrUpdate.delete({colors: ["red"]})

However, both actions cannot be represented in the same AttributeUpdates object.

// Will not work as expected
attrUpdate.add({colors: ["orange"]}).delete({colors: ["red"]});

The action to delete "red" overwrites the action to add "orange". This is simply because colors is a property of the AttrubuteUpdates object.

The following code demonstrates the above note:

JSON.stringify(attrUpdate.add({colors: ["orange"]}));
//{"colors":{"Action":"ADD","Value":{"SS":["orange"]}}}

JSON.stringify(attrUpdate.delete({colors: ["red"]}));
//{"colors":{"Action":"DELETE","Value":{"SS":["red"]}}}

// The below does not work as expected
JSON.stringify(attrUpdate.add({colors: ["orange"]}).delete({colors: ["red"]}));
//{"colors":{"Action":"DELETE","Value":{"SS":["red"]}}}

The library does not perform checks.

It is upto the application to ensure that the application follows the SDK requirements. This utility does not perform any checks.

For example, DynamoDB attribute value NS is meant to represents a set of numbers. If, by mistake, the application creates the structure {"NS": [1, 3, "string"]}, this utility will not detect that the third element is an invalid element (string). Such checks are left to the application.

Platform

This utility is designed for node.js. For use in the browser, it will need to be adapted. This is in lieu of the recent (October 2013) Developer Preview - AWS SDK for JavaScript in the Browser

To adapt this utility for the browser, following are few todos. (This list is not exhaustive)

Possible use of lodash or underscore to ensure browser compatibility of functions which iterate over objects. Currently lib/util.js has a function to iterate over object properties which is sufficient for use with Node.js.

Change log

##Version 1.0.0

2015-02-11

Note: There are no source code changes in version 1.0.0. Functionally, 1.0.0 is identical to 0.2.7.

Bumped from version 0.2.7 to version 1.0.0.
Update documentation especially with regard to B and BS data types.
Added development deps into pacakge.json instead of tests/package.json (It should have been this way to begin with)

Note: Change log dates are yyyy-mm-dd.