Lightweight extension of Angular Firestore. Provides a more intuitive API. Create, Update, Insert-or-Update (Upsert), Check for Existence, Download Once, Download and listen for changes.
Next page: API
npm install extended-angular-firestore --save
import { ExtendedAngularFirestore } from 'extended-angular-firestore';
export class Example {
constructor(eaf: ExtendedAngularFirestore) {
const ref = 'reference string to Firestore database location';
const doc: DocType = documentOfYourChoiceHere;
eaf.createNewDocument<DocType>(ref, doc); // creates a new doc at reference ref
eaf.updateExistingDocument<DocType>(ref, doc); // updates existing document with value doc
eaf.upsert<DocType>(ref, doc); // updates the document if it exists
// otherwise, creates a new document at reference ref
}
}
The goal of the API is to help the programmer manage Observable Subscriptions, so you only ask for exactly what you want. You can either ask to download a document or a collection exactly once, in which case you get back a Promise that resolves to the value of the document you are requesting. Or you can listen to a document or a collection, in which case you get back an Observable you can subscribe to (and might have to unsubscribe from). This structure has helped me avoid annoying double-request errors where I failed to unsubscribe from a stream I hadn't realized I was still subscribed to.
This package also handles existence/nonexistence gracefully, which has been a weakness of both Firebase and Firestore in the past. To create or modify a document, simply use the Upsert method, which does the existence checking for you.
Finally, the API extension is lightweight -- about 100 lines of TypeScript and three RXJS operators (which AngularFire may already need).
In app.module.ts
, import ExtendedAngularFirestoreModule, instead of AngularFireModue, as follows.
Delete this line:
AngularFireModule.initializeApp(FIREBASE_CONFIG);
Replace it with this line:
ExtendedAngularFirestoreModule.forRoot(FIREBASE_CONFIG);
In more complete context:
import { ExtendedAngularFirestoreModule } from 'extended-angular-firestore';
import { FirebaseAppConfig } from 'angularfire2';
const FIREBASE_CONFIG: FirebaseAppConfig = {
apiKey: '<your-key>',
authDomain: '<your-project-authdomain>',
databaseURL: '<your-database-URL>',
projectId: '<your-project-id>',
storageBucket: '<your-storage-bucket>',
messagingSenderId: '<your-messaging-sender-id>'
}
@NgModule({
declarations: [],
imports: [
ExtendedAngularFirestoreModule.forRoot(FIREBASE_CONFIG)
],
providers: [],
bootstrap: []
})
export class AppModule { }
AngularFire2 is a peer dependency of ExtendedAngularFirestore, so if you use npm to install this library, angularfire2 will be available to import from as well.
Next page: API