Validate nested properties (Array & Object)

[A-312]

Follow this standard for Object should be a good thing.

'+ Support array nested properties

[michaelrommel]

Dear A-312,

I saw that you are struggling with the same issues as myself and the lack of progress in node-convict.

My issue was that I wanted to use a config file with a non-fixed number of subkeys underneath acmeProviders. I tried both variants Arrays and Objects, but am struggling and wondered, whether you have a good strategy for that usecase:

{
  "pidfilename": "cra-api.pid",
  "pidpath": "/run/",
  "topic": {
    "listentopic": "new-order",
    "informtopic": "update-order"
  },
  "acmeProviders": [
    { "name": "providerA",
      "url": "https://server1/dir",
      "nameservers": ["192.168.1.1"],
      "pdnsapi": "http://192.168.1.1",
      "accountKey": "/conf/.creds_acme_providerA"
    },
    { "name": "providerB",
      "url": "letsencrypt.staging",
      "nameservers": ["192.168.2.2"],
      "pdnsapi": "http://192.168.2.2",
      "accountKey": "/conf/.creds_acme_providerB"
    },
    { "name": "providerC",
      "url": "https://server3.foo.bar.org/dir",
      "nameservers": ["192.168.3.3"],
      "pdnsapi": "http://192.168.3.3",
      "accountKey": "/conf/.creds_acme_providerC"
    }
  ]
}

This together with customFormats like this:

import acme from 'acme-client';
convict.addFormats({
  acmeUrl: {
    validate: function (x) {
      if (x === 'letsencrypt.staging' ||
          x === 'letsencrypt.production') {
        return true;
      }
      if (!validator.isURL(x, { require_tld: false })) {
        throw new Error('must be an URL');
      }
    },
    coerce: function (x) {
      switch (x) {
        case 'letsencrypt.staging':
          return acme.directory.letsencrypt.staging;
        case 'letsencrypt.production':
          return acme.directory.letsencrypt.production;
        default:
          return x.toString();
      }
    }
  },
  acmeProviderArray: {
    validate: function (x, schema) {
      if (!Array.isArray(x)) {
        throw new Error('must be an array');
      }
      for (const p of x) {
        convict(schema.children).load(p).validate();
      }
    },
    coerce: function (x, schema) {
      for (const p of x) {
        convict(schema.children).load(p).toString();
      }
    }
  }, ...

is actually working for validating the whole structure.

But what is missing is, that when the config file is loaded (before a call to .validate()) the coerce functions are basically skipped because in the code the custom converters call is skipped for arrays because of

 if (typeof v === 'string') {

So that means that my custom replacement of the string letsencrypt.staging with the value from the acme module is not working. It only works for validation or in the .toString() context.

Do you have some idea or want to implement coercion also for arrays and such?

Thanks,

Michael.

[A-312]

Do you try this on https://blueconfig.js.org/tutorial-custom-formats-object-arr.html ?

[michaelrommel]

Hi,
yeah, I tried something along these lines. As I said, the coerce method is not working properly, validate is working fine. I solved my use case now in another way, by not coercing, but by deriving another value which was previously set to null to a derived string, when I load the config file. So it is not encapsulated inside the schema and the addFormat code but in another place.
Thanks for your suggestion, though!
Have a good year!