CODEWITHSUNDEEP
meteormeteor-accounts
shmck
shmck

Reputation: 5629

Meteor get usernames from userId, easier method

Using Meteor:

I have a list of messages in Messages which store a userId.

Messages = new Mongo.Collection('messages'); 

// example of message data:

{
authorId: 'XFdsafddfs1sfd', // corresponding to a Meteor.userId
content: 'some Message'
}

And I'm publishing both the messages and the existing users.

Meteor.publish('messages', function () {
  return Messages.find({});
});

Meteor.publish('users', function () {
  return Meteor.users.find({});
});

Currently I can grab the list of messages and add the usernames based on the userIds. Since users can change their usernames & profile information, it doesn't make sense to add user data to the collection, just the userIds.

var messages = Messages.find({}).fetch();
var messages.forEach(function(message) {
    message.username = Meteor.users.find(message.authorId).fetch() [0].username; // ugly
  });

This code works, but involves a lot of wasteful calls. I want to know how to accomplish this in a better way.

In Meteor, what is the most efficient & cleanest way to pair user data with a collection containing userIds?

Upvotes: 4

Views: 2493

Answers (1)

Sbl
Sbl

Reputation: 67

This is a common use case: storing ids of other collections in the db and using human readable arguments on the UI.

In Meteor the collection.find() function offers to pass a transformation callback for this use case.

var cursor = messages.find(
    {},
    {   
        transform: transformMessage
    }
);

The transform function can now directly modify your object, to add/modify/delete the properties of your fetched object (attention: don't modify/delete on client side for security reasons: instead use filters on the server side and allow/deny).

function transformMessage(message) {
    var user = Meteor.users.findOne(message.authorId);
    if (user) {
        var username = user.username;
        message.username = username;
    }
    return message;
};

The great benefit of this way: You are still working with the cursor and preventing fetch(). And of course, cleaner code.

Upvotes: 6

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