todomvc-ember-orbit

This is a TodoMVC app that uses Ember.js (Octane edition) and ember-orbit on the client-side.

This repo also contains a server implementation that uses orbit-server to provide JSON:API endpoints for some of the scenarios below.

Installation

This repo uses a yarn workspace to manage dependencies. All dependencies can be installed via:

yarn install

Running

To run the client app:

cd ./client
yarn start

To run the server app (optional for many scenarios below):

cd ./server
yarn start

The demo can then be accessed at: http://localhost:4200

Scenario 1: Memory-only

The default application just relies on the in-memory store service that's installed by default by ember-orbit.

Since data is only kept in memory, you'll be starting over with each page refresh.

Scenario 2: Memory + Backup

In order to persist data, one option is to connect your store to browser-based storage such as IndexedDB.

To configure this scenario, run the following from the ./client directory (note: the first reset step is only necessary if you've made local changes to the repo):

git reset --hard && git clean -f -d && yarn install

ember g data-source backup --from=@orbit/indexeddb
ember g data-strategy store-backup-sync

This will generate a backup source and add a sync strategy that observes the store and syncs any mutations to backup.

After restarting your app (yarn start), data should now be persisted across page refreshes.

You may wonder how the store is populated from backup in the first place. The application route's beforeModel hook checks for a backup source in the coordinator and, if one is present, populates the store prior to activating the coordinator:

  // app/routes/application.js

  async beforeModel() {
    console.log("Sources:", this.dataCoordinator.sourceNames);

    // If a backup source is present, populate the store from backup prior to
    // activating the coordinator
    const backup = this.dataCoordinator.getSource("backup");
    if (backup) {
      const transform = await backup.pull(q => q.findRecords());
      await this.store.sync(transform);
    }

    await this.dataCoordinator.activate();
    await this.store.query(q => q.findRecords("todo"));
  }

Scenario 3: Memory + Remote

An alternative to using browser storage is to fetch and persist data to a backend server. Let's add an @orbit/jsonapi source that will communicate with our demo server.

To configure this scenario, run the following from the ./client directory:

git reset --hard && git clean -f -d && yarn install

ember g data-source remote --from=@orbit/jsonapi
ember g data-strategy remote-store-sync
ember g data-strategy store-beforequery-remote-query
ember g data-strategy store-beforeupdate-remote-update

This will generate a remote source and add sync and request strategies that connect it to your store.

Make sure to start both your server and client before trying it out.

Because all strategies are pessimistic (i.e. blocking: true) by default, data will only be persisted locally after it has been persisted remotely.

If you change your request strategies to be optimistic (i.e. blocking: false), then requests will succeed locally regardless of whether they succeed remotely. However, this approach is not recommended unless it's paired with a local backup.

Pessimistic Error Handling

It's important that errors are handled appropriately in Orbit. Once an error occurs processing a request, that source's requestQueue will be paused, waiting for you to handle the issue and then restart processing the queue.

In a pessimistic scenario, you can be assured that a failure on the remote source will also block the requestQueue for the store.

A simplistic strategy for handling failures would be to log the errors, skip the current task in the queues, and then re-throw the error so that it could be handled at the call site. Let's do this by editing app/data-strategies/store-beforeupdate-remote-update.js to include a catch handler:

      catch(e, transform) {
        console.log("Error performing remote.update()", transform, e);
        this.source.requestQueue.skip(e);
        this.target.requestQueue.skip(e);
        throw e;
      },

Note that you might want to inspect the error and perform some custom error handling, perhaps even choosing to not rethrow the error (e.g. if a record is being deleted and the server returns a 404).

You may also choose to add some custom error handling at the call site in the component layer:

  @action async removeTodo() {
    try {
      await this.args.todo.remove();
    } catch (e) {
      // Custom error handling here
      alert("An unexpected error occurred.");
    }
  }

Remember to also provide error handling for queries as well as updates.

Scenario 4: Memory + Backup + Remote

In order to provide a robust optimistic UI it's recommended that you use a backup source to capture local data AND a data bucket to capture all in-flight state for sources. This combination should prevent data loss, even when your app is closed accidentally.

To configure this scenario, run the following from the ./client directory:

git reset --hard && git clean -f -d && yarn install

ember g data-source backup --from=@orbit/indexeddb
ember g data-source remote --from=@orbit/jsonapi
ember g data-strategy store-backup-sync
ember g data-strategy remote-store-sync
ember g data-strategy store-beforequery-remote-query
ember g data-strategy store-beforeupdate-remote-update
ember g data-bucket main

Next, change the request strategies to be optimistic by changing blocking: true to blocking: false in the request strategies:

app/data-strategies/store-beforequery-remote-query.js
app/data-strategies/store-beforeupdate-remote-update.js

Optimistic Error Handling

Error handling is, by necessity, a bit different for optimistic strategies than for pessimistic strategies. Optimistic strategies won't block the successful completion of an action based upon what happens downstream. For instance, a record might be added or removed from the store without knowing whether the subsequent request to the remote source will be successful.

In order to handle these scenarios well, you need to consider the different types of errors that may occur and make a plan for each. For instance, you should consider whether you want to handle queries differently from updates. Orbit gives you pretty complete control, so let's talk through a few scenarios.

Let's say that, in the event of a network outage, you want to do the following:

Drop any remote query requests that have hung. Instead, you'll just rely on client-side data until you're back online.
Queue any update requests that can't be processed immediately and then periodically retry them.

These scenarios could be handled via catch handlers in:

app/data-strategies/store-beforequery-remote-query.js
app/data-strategies/store-beforeupdate-remote-update.js

For instance, query requests could be dropped with:

      catch() {
        // skip the current query request in the remote queue
        this.target.requestQueue.skip();
      },

This will only apply to query requests initiated by this particular strategy (which may be just fine for this app).

If you prefer to instead provide an error-handling strategy that will apply to remote queries that fail regardless of where the request originated, create a specific strategy that observes the queryFail event on the remote source:

ember g data-strategy remote-queryfail

Then edit app/data-strategies/remote-queryfail.js:

import { RequestStrategy } from "@orbit/coordinator";

export default {
  create() {
    return new RequestStrategy({
      name: "remote-queryfail",
      source: "remote",
      on: "queryFail",
      action() {
        this.source.requestQueue.skip();
      }
    });
  }
};

Now let's implement a more advanced update failure handling strategy:

ember g data-strategy remote-updatefail

Then edit app/data-strategies/remote-updatefail.js:

import { RequestStrategy } from "@orbit/coordinator";
import { NetworkError } from "@orbit/data";

export default {
  create() {
    return new RequestStrategy({
      name: "remote-updatefail",
      source: "remote",
      on: "updateFail",

      action(transform, e) {
        const remote = this.source;
        const store = this.coordinator.getSource("store");

        if (e instanceof NetworkError) {
          // When network errors are encountered, try again in 3s
          console.log("NetworkError - will try again soon");
          setTimeout(() => {
            remote.requestQueue.retry();
          }, 3000);
        } else {
          // When non-network errors occur, notify the user and
          // reset state.
          let label = transform.options && transform.options.label;
          if (label) {
            alert(`Unable to complete "${label}"`);
          } else {
            alert(`Unable to complete operation`);
          }

          // Roll back store to position before transform
          if (store.transformLog.contains(transform.id)) {
            console.log("Rolling back - transform:", transform.id);
            store.rollback(transform.id, -1);
          }

          return remote.requestQueue.skip();
        }
      }
    });
  }
};

As described in the comments, this strategy treats network errors differently from non-network errors. Network errors during updates will simply retry the current request every few seconds. However, if another type of error occurs, such as a 4xx or 5xx error, then the user will be notified, the store will be rolled back to a position before the transform, and the transform will be skipped in the queue. This is a rather brute force approach to dealing with errors. Even better would be to analyze the error (e) and attempt to figure out what went wrong and whether it could be corrected.

License

MIT License (see LICENSE for details).

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