pipeline-js
Hassle free pipeline pattern implementation with the support for sync and async stages
Introduction
Pipeline JS allows you to implement the pipeline pattern while creating reusable pipelines in your Javascript applications. You can create pipelines consisting of one or more stages once and then process them using different payloads. Pipeline processing is initiated by some payload and this payload will be passed from stage to stage in order to complete the required process.
General Pipeline Example
To demonstrate it using an example, consider a request made to access user by id; the pipeline may consist of stages including getUserById, transformUser, convertToJson and return. And for each next stage, the input comes from the last stage i.e.
->(User ID)>>getUserById()
->(User Detail)>>transformUser()
->(Transformed Detail)>>convertToJson()
->(User Detail.json)>>returnSample Programmatic implementation
While using Pipeline JS, it can be written programmatically as
// First syntax
var userPipeline = new Pipeline([
getUserById,
transformUser,
convertToJson
]);
// Alternatively, you may write the same using the pipe method
var userPipeline = (new Pipeline()).pipe(getUserById)
.pipe(transformUser)
.pipe(convertToJson);
// Then this pipeline can be used with any payload i.e.
var userJson = userPipeline.process(10); // JSON detail for the user with ID 10
var userJson = userPipeline.process(23); // JSON detail for the user with ID 23Where stages shown above can be anything invokable. The sample implementation for the stages may be something like below
// For example, methods from some objects
var getUserById = UserModel.getUserById,
transformUser = Transformers.transformUser,
convertToJson = Utility.convertToJson;
// Or functions
var getUserById = function (userId) {
//..
return promise;
};
var transformUser = function (userDetail) {
// ..
return transformedObject;
};
var convertToJson = function(userDetail) {
// ..
return jsonString;
};Using pipeline will not only allow constructing reusable pipelines but also result in comparatively cleaner and readable code i.e. consider the following example
var output = JSON.stringify(transformFilters(getSelectedFilters()));
// It can be transformed to
var pipeline = new Pipeline([
getSelectedFilters,
transformFilters,
JSON.stringify
]);
// Or maybe use the alternate syntax
var pipeline = (new Pipeline()).pipe(getSelectedFilters)
.pipe(transformFilters)
.pipe(JSON.stringify);
// Get the output by processing the pipeline
var output = pipeline.process();Installation
Run the below command to install using NPM
npm install --save pipeline-js
Usage
Operations in a pipeline i.e. stages can be anything that is callable i.e. closures and anything that's invokable is good.
In order to create a pipeline, you can either pass the stages as an array parameter to constructor
var pipeline = require('pipeline-js');
// Creating pipeline using constructor parameterå
var pipeline = new Pipeline([
invokableStage1,
invokableStage2,
invokableStage3
]);
// Process pipeline with payload1
var output1 = pipeline.process(payload1);
var output2 = pipeline.process(payload2);Or you can create a pipeline object and call the pipe method on it to successively add the invokable stages
var pipeline = require('pipeline-js');
// Creating pipeline using pipe method
var pipeline = (new Pipeline()).pipe(invokableStage1)
.pipe(invokableStage2)
.pipe(invokableStage3
// Process pipeline with payload1
var output1 = pipeline.process(payload1);
var output2 = pipeline.process(payload2);Sync/Async Usage
The only difference between the synchronous usage and asynchronous usage is how the output is handled. For both types of usages, pipelines are created the same way. The difference is when you call the process() method, if the pipeline has all the stages returning concrete output the process method returns concrete value, however if any of the stages returns a promise then the process method returns promise and you will have to use .then() to get the output.
Examples for both the sync and async usage are given below
Sync Example
How to use when all the stages return concrete values?
If none of the stages return promise then
process(payload)will return concrete value
var addOne = function (x) {
return x + 1;
};
var square = function (x) {
return x * x;
};
var minusTwo = function (x) {
return x - 2;
};
// Without pipeline
// - Not reusable
// - Not that clean
var output1 = minusTwo(square(addOne(10)));
var output2 = minusTwo(square(addOne(10)));
// With Pipeline
// Reusable with different payload
// Cleaner
var someFormula = new Pipeline([
addOne,
square,
minusTwo
]);
var result = someFormula.process(10); // 10 + 1 => 11
// 11 * 11 => 121
// 121 - 2 => 119
console.log(result); // (int) 119
var result = someFormula.process(20); // 20 + 1 => 21
// 21 * 21 => 441
// 441 - 2 => 339
console.log(result); // (int) 339Or maybe you can write the same example as
var someFormula = (new Pipeline()).pipe(addOne)
.pipe(square)
.pipe(minusTwo);
var output1 = someFormula.process(20);
var output2 = someFormula.process(20);Async Example
How to use when one or all of the stages return promise?
If any single of the stages returns a promise,
process(payload)will return a promise
var Pipeline = require('pipeline-js');
// Gets the user by ID and returns promise
var getUserById = function (userId) {
var q = q.defer();
// ..
return q.promise;
};
// Transforms the user
var transformUser = function (userDetail) {
return {
name: userDetail.name,
email: userDetail.email,
password: '*****'
};
};
// Converts to JSON
var createJson = function (object) {
return JSON.stringify(object);
};
var pipeline = new Pipeline([
getUserById, // Returns promise
transformUser,
createJson
]);
// process() will return promise; since one of the stages returns a promise
var output = pipeline.process(142)
.then(function(userJson){
console.log(userJson); // (string) {"name": "John Doe", "email": "[email protected]", "password": "****"}
})
.catch(function(error) {
console.log(error);
});
var output = pipeline.process(263) // promise will be returned
.then(function(userJson){
console.log(userJson); // (string) {"name": "Jane Doe", "email": "[email protected]", "password": "****"}
})
.catch(function(error) {
console.log(error);
});Altneratively,
// Same pipeline using `pipe` method
var pipeline = (new Pipeline()).pipe(getUserById) // Returns promise
.pipe(transformUser)
.pipe(createJson);
var output = pipeline.process(142) // promise will be returned; since one of the stages returns a promise
.then(function(userJson){
console.log(userJson); // (string) {"name": "John Doe", "email": "[email protected]", "password": "****"}
})
.catch(function(error) {
console.log(error);
});Sidenote
You may also want to check this pipeline proposal
Contribution
Feel free to fork, extend, create issues, create PRs or spread the word.
License
MIT © Kamran Ahmed