Keeping CouchDB design docs up to date with Node.js

CouchDB views are defined typically as Javascript snippets and are part of special documents called design documents. I noticed that keeping these design documents up to date during development is pretty cumbersome and error prone. So I devised simply way to keep them updated using Node.js and Cradle couchdb driver.

Idea is to define the views in as variables in runnable js script and run that with Node each time it’s changed.

Here is the code. Copy it to e.g. cdb-views.js.

var cradle = require('cradle');

cradle.setup({ host: 'localhost',
               port: 5984,
               options: { cache:true, raw: false }});

var cclient = new (cradle.Connection)

function _createdb(dbname) {
    var db = cclient.database(dbname);
    db.exists(function(err, exists) {
        if (!exists) {
            db.create()
        }
    });
    return db;
}
var DB_SOMETHING = _createdb('somedb')

function cradle_error(err, res) {
    if (err) console.log(err)
}


function update_views( db, docpath, code ) {

    function save_doc() {
        db.save(docpath, code, function(err) {
            // view has changed, so initiate cleanup to get rid of old
            // indexes
            db.viewCleanup( cradle_error );
        });

        return true;
    }

    function compare_code( str1, str2 ) {
        var p1 = str1.split('\n');
        var p2 = str2.split('\n');

        for ( var i=0; i < p1.length || i < p2.length; i++ ) {
            var l1 = p1[i];
            var l2 = p2[i];
            l1 = l1 ? l1.trim() : '';
            l2 = l2 ? l2.trim() : '';
            if ( !l1 && !l2 ) continue;
            if ( l1 != l2 ) return true;
        }
        return false;
    }

    // compare function definitions in document and in code
    function compare_def(docdef, codedef) {
        var i = 0;

        if (!docdef && codedef) {
            console.log('creating "' + docpath +'"')
            return true;
        }
        if (!codedef && docdef) {
            console.log('removing "' + docpath +'"')
            return true;
        }
        if (!codedef && !docdef) {
            return false;
        }

        for (var u in docdef) {

            i++;
            if (codedef[u] == undefined) {
                console.log('definition of "' + u + '" removed - updating "' + docpath +'"')
                return true;
            }

            if (typeof(codedef[u]) == 'function') {
                if (!codedef[u] || compare_code( docdef[u], codedef[u].toString()) ) {
                    console.log('definition of "' + u + '" changed - updating "' + docpath +'"')
                    return true;
                }
            } else for (var f in docdef[u]) {
                i++;
                if (!codedef[u][f] || compare_code( docdef[u][f], codedef[u][f].toString()) ) {
                    console.log('definition of "' + u + '.' + f + '" changed - updating "' + docpath +'"')
                    return true;
                }

            }
        }
        // check that both doc and code have same number of functions
        for (var u in codedef) {
            i--;
            if (typeof(codedef[u]) != 'function') {
                for (var f in codedef[u]) {
                    i--;
                }
            }
        }
        if (i != 0) {
            console.log('new definitions - updating "' + docpath +'"')
            return true;
        }

        return false;
    }

    db.get(docpath, function(err, doc) {

        if (!doc) {
            console.log('not found - creating "' + docpath +'"')
            return save_doc();
        }

        if (compare_def(doc.updates, code.updates) || compare_def(doc.views, code.views)) {
            return save_doc();
        }
        console.log('"' + docpath +'" up to date')
    });
}

var EXAMPLE1_DDOC = {
    language: 'javascript',
    views: {
        active: {
            map: function (doc) {
                if (doc.lastsession) {
                    emit(parseInt(doc.lastsession / 1000), 1)
                }
            },
            reduce: function(keys, counts, rereduce) {
                return sum(counts)
            }
        },
        users: function(doc) { 
            if (doc.created) {
                emit(parseInt(doc.created / 1000), 1)
            }
        }
    }    
}

var EXAMPLE2_DDOC = {
    language: 'javascript',
    views: {
        myview: function(doc) {
            if (doc.param1 && doc.param2) {
                emit([doc.param1, doc.param2], null)
            }
        }
    }
}

update_views(DB_SOMETHING, '_design/example1', EXAMPLE1_DDOC);
update_views(DB_SOMETHING, '_design/example2', EXAMPLE2_DDOC);

The code is pretty simple.

1. First it loads the Cradle couchdb driver and creates needed databases if they do not already exist. In this example only single database ‘somedb’ is created.
2. The update_views is responsible of keeping the design docs up to date. It loads the design doc from defined DB and compares it to the code defined in the design doc in this file. If it has changed (or missing) it will be recreated.
3. The example design docs (EXAMPLE1_DDOC and EXAMPLE2_DDOC) are simple design doc definitions as Javascript object. You’re familiar with CouchDB so this is self explanatory.
4. Lastly the code just calls the update_views to update the design documents.

Now it’s possible to maintain the views in this Javascript file, the Node will make sure that the syntax is always valid.

Example output:

Views are up to date.

$ node cdb-views.js
"_design/example1" up to date
"_design/example2" up to date

Definition of view example2/myview has changed

$ node cdb-views.js
"_design/example1" up to date
definition of "myview" changed - updating "_design/example2"

Design doc example2 can not be found and is created.

$ node cdb-views.js
"_design/example1" up to date
no design doc found updating "_design/example2"