next-rest-framework

Next REST Framework

Type-safe, self-documenting REST APIs for Next.js

Table of contents

• Table of contents
• Overview
• Features
  • Lightweight, type-safe, easy to use
• Installation
• Getting started
  • Initialize client
  • Initialize catch-all handler
  • Add an API Route
• Config options
• Route config
  • Method handlers
    • Request body
    • Response object
    • Handler
• Middlewares
  • Global middleware
  • Route middleware
  • Method middleware
• Error handlers
  • Global error handler
  • Route error handler
  • Method error handler
• Changelog
• Contributing
• License

Overview

Next REST Framework is an open-source, opinionated, lightweight, easy-to-use set of tools to build type-safe, self-documenting HTTP REST APIs with Next.js. Building OpenAPI specification-compliant REST APIs can be cumbersome and slow but Next REST Framework makes this easy with auto-generated OpenAPI documents and Swagger UI using TypeScript and object schemas.

This is a monorepo containing the following packages / projects:

• The primary next-rest-framework package
• A development test application

Features

Lightweight, type-safe, easy to use

• Designed to work with TypeScript so that your request bodies, responses, headers etc. are strongly typed.
• Object-schema validation with popular libraries like Zod or Yup
• Supports auto-generated openapi.json and openapi.yaml documents for which you can include your existing OpenAPI specification.
• Supports any kind of middleware logic that you want to use for authentication etc. See more in Middlewares. Also works with other Next.js server-side libraries, like NextAuth.js.
• Fully customizable - You can decide which routes Next REST Framework will use to serve your API docs etc. and it can be easily customized to work with any kind of existing Next.js REST API.

Installation

npm install --save next-rest-framework

Getting started

Initialize client

To use Next REST Framework you need to initialize the client somewhere in your Next.js project. The client exposes all functionality of the framework you will need:

// next-rest-framework/client.ts

import { NextRestFramework } from 'next-rest-framework';

export const { defineCatchAllHandler, defineEndpoints } = NextRestFramework();

The complete API of the initialized client is the following:

Name	Description
defineCatchAllHandler	A function used to generate your single catch-all API route. Must be used in the root of your API routes folder in the following path pages/api/[[...next-rest-framework]].ts.
defineEndpoints	Used for all other API routes that you want to use Next REST Framework for. Can also be used in other catch-all API routes.
getOpenApiSpec	A function that exposes the generated OpenAPI spec combined with your own definitions. Useful if you want to e.g. export the OpenAPI spec to a separate file.

Initialize catch-all handler

To initialize Next REST Framework you need to export and call the defineCatchAllHandler function from a root-level optional catch-all API route:

// pages/api/[[...next-rest-framework]].ts

import { defineCatchAllHandler } from 'next-rest-framework/client';

export default defineCatchAllHandler();

This is enough to get you started. By default Next REST Framework gives you three API routes with this configuration:

• /api: Swagger UI using the auto-generated OpenAPI spec.
• /api/openapi.json: An auto-generated openapi.json document.
• /api/openapi.yaml: An auto-generated openapi.yaml document.

All of these are configurable with the Config options that you can pass for your NextRestFramework client. You can also use your existing catch-all logic simply by passing a Route config to your defineCatchAllHandler if you want to use e.g. custom 404 handlers, redirections etc.

Add an API Route

// pages/api/todos.ts

import { object, string, number, boolean, array } from 'zod';
import { defineEndpoints } from 'next-rest-framework/client';

// Can be a `zod` schema as well.
const todoSchema = object({
  id: string(),
  name: string(),
  completed: boolean()
});

export default defineEndpoints({
  GET: {
    responses: [
      {
        status: 200,
        contentType: 'application/json',
        schema: object({
          data: array(todoSchema)
        })
      }
    ],
    handler: ({ res }) => {
      // Using any other content type, status code or response data format will lead to TS error.
      res.setHeader('content-type', 'application/json');
      res.status(200).json({
        data: [
          {
            id: 'foo',
            name: 'bar',
            completed: true
          }
        ]
      });
    }
  },
  POST: {
    requestBody: {
      contentType: 'application/json',
      schema: object({
        name: string()
      })
    },
    responses: [
      {
        status: 201,
        contentType: 'application/json',
        schema: object({
          data: todoSchema
        })
      }
    ],
    handler: ({
      res,
      req: {
        body: {
          name // Any other attribute will lead to TS error.
        }
      }
    }) => {
      const todo = createYourTodo(name);
      res.setHeader('content-type', 'application/json');
      res.status(201).json({
        data: todo
      });
    }
  }
});

These type-safe endpoints will be now auto-generated to your OpenAPI spec and Swagger UI!

Config options

The optional config options allow you to customize Next REST Framework. The following options can be passed as a parameter for your NextRestFramework client in an object:

Name	Description
openApiSpec	Your custom OpenAPI Object that will be merged with the auto-generated spec. Defaults to a minimum config required for the OpenAPI spec generation.
openApiJsonPath	Custom path for serving openapi.json file. Defaults to /api/openapi.json.
openApiYamlPath	Custom path for serving openapi.yaml file. Defaults to /api/openapi.yaml.
swaggerUiPath	Custom path for service Swagger UI. Defaults to /api.
exposeOpenApiSpec	Setting this to false will serve none of the OpenAPI documents neither the Swagger UI. Defaults to true.
middleware	A global middleware for all of your API routes. See Global middleware for more information.
errorHandler	A Global error handler for all of your API routes. Defaults to a basic error handler logging the errors in non-production mode.
suppressInfo	Setting this to true will suppress all informational logs from Next REST Framework. Defaults to false.

Route config

In addition to your method handlers, middleware and errorHandler, you can also configure OpenAPI Path Item Object parameters for your API route and they will automatically become part of your auto-generated OpenAPI spec The following options can be passed as a parameter for your defineCatchAllHandler and defineEndpoints in an object:

Name	Description	Required
GET | PUT | POST | DELETE | OPTIONS | HEAD | PATCH | TRACE	A Method handler object.	true
middleware	A Middleware function that takes in the return values from your Global middleware.	false
errorHandler	A Route error handler for this API route, overriding the Global error handler.	false
$ref	A reference to another Path Item Object.	false
description	A string description, intended to apply to all operations in this path. CommonMark syntax MAY be used for rich text representation.	false
servers	An array of Server Objects.	false
parameters	An array of Parameter objects or Reference objects.	false

Method handlers

Name	Description	Required
requestBody	A Request body object.	false
responses	An array of Response objects.	true
middleware	A Middleware function that takes in the return values from both your Global middleware and Route middleware.	false
handler	Your Handler function that takes in your typed request, response and Middleware parameters and contains all of your business logic.	true
errorHandler	A Method error handler for this method, overriding both the Global error handler and Route error handler.	false

Request body

The required properties are used for internal type-checking and the optional properties are used for OpenAPI spec generation and come from the OpenAPI Request Body Object and Media Type Object specification.

Name	Description	Required
contentType	The content type that all requests must have - requests with no content type or incorrect content type will get an error response.	true
schema	A Zod or Yup schema describing the format of the request body.	true
description	A brief description of the request body. This could contain examples of use. CommonMark syntax MAY be used for rich text representation.	false
required	Determines if the request body is required in the request. All requests without a body will get an error response when this is set to true. Defaults to false.	false
example	An example object matching the schema.	false
examples	A mapping of Example Objects or Reference Objects matching the schema.	false
encoding	A mapping of Encoding Objects.	false

Response object

Name	Description	Required
description	A short description of the response. CommonMark syntax MAY be used for rich text representation.	true
status	A possible status code returned by your API route.	true
contentType	The content type of the response. Using any other content-type will lead to a TS error.	true
schema	A Zod or Yup schema describing the format of the response data. All response data not matching to the schema will lead to a TS error.	true
headers	A mapping of headers to Header Objects or Reference Objects.	false
links	A mapping of Link Objects or Reference Objects.	false

Handler

The handler function takes care of your actual business logic, supporting both synchronous and asynchronous execution and taking in an object with three strongly typed parameters:

Name	Description
req	A strongly-typed NextApiRequest object containing the typed body of your request.
res	A strongly-typed NextApiResponse object that allows you to use only pre-defined status codes, Content-Type headers and response data formats from the current method handler.
params	An object containing the strongly-typed combined response of your Global middleware, Route middleware and Method middleware. The parameters can also be overridden in the different middleware layers with the Method middleware taking precedence over the Route middleware and route middleware taking precedence over Global middleware

Middlewares

The middleware functions can be used for any kind of middleware logic, like adding authentication etc. for your API. In addition, they can be used to add additional typed parameters for your API route handlers. They support both asynchronous and synchronous execution.

// A global middleware, route middleware or method middleware.
middleware: () => ({
  foo: 'bar'
});
// A method handler (given that the middleware above is either in the same API route or method, or is a global middleware).
handler: ({
  params: {
    foo // string
  }
}) => {
  // Your logic.
};

Global middleware

The global middleware function takes in an object with two attributes and optionally returns an object of any form:

Name	Description
req	A plain NextApiRequest object.
res	A plain NextApiResponse object.

Route middleware

The route middleware function takes in an object with three attributes and optionally returns an object of any form:

Name	Description
req	A plain NextApiRequest object.
res	A plain NextApiResponse object.
params	The type of an object returned by your Global middleware.

Method middleware

The method middleware function takes in an object with three attributes and optionally returns an object of any form:

Name	Description
req	A strongly-typed NextApiRequest object containing the typed body of your request.
res	A strongly-typed NextApiResponse object that allows you to use only pre-defined status codes, Content-Type headers and response data formats from the current method handler.
params	The type of a combined object returned by both your Global middleware and Route middleware.

Error handlers

The error handler functions can be used for custom error handling. They support both asynchronous and synchronous execution.

// A global error handler, route error handler or method error handler.
errorHandler: ({ req, res, params }) => {
  // Your error handling logic.
};

Global error handler

The global error handler takes in an object with two attributes:

Name	Description
req	A plain NextApiRequest object.
res	A plain NextApiResponse object.

Route error handler

Route error handler can be used to override your global error handler. The route error handler takes in an object with three attributes:

Name	Description
req	A plain NextApiRequest object.
res	A plain NextApiResponse object.
params	The type of a combined object returned by both your Global middleware and Route middleware.

Method error handler

Method error handler can be used to override both your global error handler and route error handler. The method error handler takes in an object with three attributes and optionally returns an object of any form:

Name	Description
req	A strongly-typed NextApiRequest object containing the typed body of your request.
res	A strongly-typed NextApiResponse object that allows you to use only pre-defined status codes, Content-Type headers and response data formats from the current method handler.
params	The type of a combined object returned by your Global middleware, Route middleware and Method middleware.

Changelog

See the changelog in CHANGELOG.md

Contributing

All contributions are welcome!

License

ISC, see full license in LICENSE.

Changelog

0.1.0 - 2022-12-03

Added

• Added initial version of Next REST Framework.