xhr

What is xhr?

The xhr npm package is a simple and lightweight library for making XMLHttpRequests in a browser environment. It provides a straightforward API for performing HTTP requests, handling responses, and managing errors.

What are xhr's main functionalities?

Basic GET Request

This feature allows you to perform a basic GET request to a specified URL. The callback function handles the response or any errors that occur.

const xhr = require('xhr');
xhr({ url: 'https://api.example.com/data' }, function (err, resp, body) {
  if (err) {
    console.error(err);
  } else {
    console.log(body);
  }
});

POST Request with Data

This feature allows you to perform a POST request with a JSON payload. The request includes headers to specify the content type, and the callback function handles the response or any errors.

const xhr = require('xhr');
xhr({
  url: 'https://api.example.com/data',
  method: 'POST',
  body: JSON.stringify({ key: 'value' }),
  headers: { 'Content-Type': 'application/json' }
}, function (err, resp, body) {
  if (err) {
    console.error(err);
  } else {
    console.log(body);
  }
});

Handling Response Status Codes

This feature demonstrates how to handle different HTTP response status codes. The callback function checks the status code and logs the appropriate message.

const xhr = require('xhr');
xhr({ url: 'https://api.example.com/data' }, function (err, resp, body) {
  if (err) {
    console.error(err);
  } else if (resp.statusCode === 200) {
    console.log('Success:', body);
  } else {
    console.log('Error:', resp.statusCode);
  }
});

Other packages similar to xhr

axios

Axios is a promise-based HTTP client for the browser and Node.js. It provides a more powerful and flexible API compared to xhr, including support for interceptors, automatic JSON transformation, and request cancellation.

fetch

Fetch is a built-in web API for making HTTP requests in the browser. It is a modern alternative to XMLHttpRequest and provides a more powerful and flexible API. Unlike xhr, fetch is built into modern browsers and does not require an external library.

superagent

Superagent is a small, progressive client-side HTTP request library. It provides a more feature-rich API compared to xhr, including support for promises, request retries, and plugins.

README

xhr

A small xhr wrapper

Example

var xhr = require("xhr")

xhr({
    method: "GET",
    data: someJSON,
    uri: "/foo",
    headers: {
        "Content-Type": "application/json"
    }
}, function (err, result) {
    // this === xhr
})

var req = xhr(options, callback)

the returned object is either an XMLHttpRequest instance or an XDomainRequest instance (if on IE8/IE9)

Your callback will be called once with the arguments ( Error , response , body ) where response is the context of the xhr request and body will be either xhr.response, xhr.responseText or xhr.responseXML depending on the request type.

Your callback will be called with an Error if the resulting status of the request is either 0, 4xx or 5xx

options.method

Specify the method the XMLHttpRequest should be opened with. Passed to xhr.open

options.cors

Specify whether this is a cross domain request. Used in IE<10 to use XDomainRequest instead of XMLHttpRequest. If not specified the library will pick XDomainRequest if the uri has a protocol.

options.data

Pass in data to be send across the XMLHttpRequest. Generally should be a string. But anything that's valid as a parameter to xhr.send should work

options.status

Set this to false if you do not want this module to turn a status code of 4xx, 5xx or 0 into an error.

options.uri

The uri to send a request too. Passed to xhr.open

options.headers

An object of headers that should be set on the request. The key, value pair is passed to xhr.setRequestHeader

MIT Licenced