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· Mar 4

NodeJS Iris Package - Work on node Windows?

#JavaScript #Node.js #InterSystems IRIS for Health

Hello, Does the NodeJs package work when running a node js file on windows (nodejs for windows)? I've added the package by running npm install <package location folder>

 

I have the following index.js file, but when running from node (windows) I get the following error. Does the NodeJs package build the output files when the package is added or does it just assume linux as the underlying os?

Error: Cannot find module './bin/winx64/irisnative.node'

 const IRISNative = require('intersystems-iris-native')

  let connectionInfo = {
    host: 'myserver',
    port: 1972,
    ns: 'USER',
    user: 'user',
    pwd: 'password',
    sharedmemory: true,
    timeout: 5,
    logfile: '.\\mylogfile.log'
  };

  const conn = IRISNative.createConnection(connectionInfo);
Product version: IRIS 2024.3
Discussion (5)4
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Dmitry Maslennikov · Mar 4

The support for NodeJS in IRIS is quite primitive and limited to only native functions, globals, methods, no SQL

check in IRIS folder, what do you have installed with IRIS for nodejs

I don't have windows, only docker, and in my case

/usr/irissys/bin/iris1200.node
/usr/irissys/bin/iris800.node
/usr/irissys/bin/iris1600.node
/usr/irissys/bin/iris1400.node
/usr/irissys/bin/iris1000.node
/usr/irissys/dev/nodejs/intersystems-iris-native/bin/lnxubuntuarm64/irisnative.node

If you want to use IRIS SQL from nodejs, you can try my package, which you can install with npm

npm install intersystems-iris
const { IRIS } = require("intersystems-iris");

async function main() {
    const db = new IRIS('localhost', 1972, 'USER', '_SYSTEM', 'SYS')
    console.log('connected')
    let res = await db.sql("select 1 one, 2 two")
    console.log(res.rows);
    await db.close()
}

main()

It's quite simple at the moment, only supports SQL with no parameters, but should work I believe

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John McBride · Mar 4

Hmm, so sounds like is pretty early on for the node support? Kinda hinders anyone trying to build a UI around the IRIS Apis since they are not really exposed or generally available to call via HTTP. I know these library wrap alot of internal structure to present it in a way that the library understands but still hinders anyone wanting to build a webapp around IRIS (sepcifically  not something hosted on IRIS).

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Rob Tweed · Mar 5

Not at all - it's just that Node support isn't well provided by InterSystems themselves, but we've been specialising in it since the earliest days of Node.js - since 2011 in fact.  All our integration technologies are Open Source and are in production use (and we at MGateway have been around since the mid 1990s, specialising in Web Platform integration and development products).

Personally I pretty much only do full-stack development in JavaScript (using Node.js and Bun at the back-end).  As a result, everything you need to develop extremely high-performance and highly-scalable web applications with IRIS is provided by the technologies I listed in my other reply.  If you think something that you believe you need is missing, please ask!

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Ward De Backer · Mar 5

Hi @John McBride I'm using node.js front & back-ends for many years in production. As Rob also mentions, support by InterSystems drivers is quite basic. To write scalable applications for use in production environments "the JavaScript way" you need a real Node.js back-end architecture (as mentioned in Rob's reply here) provided by the mg-dbx-napi driver (this is just the low-level driver for testing) and the QOper8 module combined with Fastify or Express (the back-end that I'm using typically).

I'm writing full-stack JS applications for 10+ years now, I used Sencha ExtJS front-end technology in the beginning but currently I'm using Vue.js and Nuxt front-ends. I'm using the REST endpoints for Vue.js and Nuxt apps served by QOper8 back-end servers. It's even possible to integrate QOper8 directly into Nuxt's server api's, but I didn't have the time yet to try this out. I'm using JS technology for 10+ years now in production and these applications are very stable.

As you'll notice, Node.js support for IRIS is mature and well supported by open-source technology. And you can take advantage of the complete Node.js module ecosystem and use it in your applications using IRIS as the underlying database + application server.

If you need to integrate a web application without a JS back-end, you can use mg_web: I'm using this technology since the year 2000 (!) and for some applications, I'm still using it without any code changes since then. This is also a very mature and well-tested back-end you can use if you want to write your application code directly in IRIS ObjectScript, without Node.js as back-end technology.

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Rob Tweed · Mar 4

For high performance and full functionality, you should use mg-dbx-napi instead:

https://github.com/chrisemunt/mg-dbx-napi

Best to use it in conjunction with QOper8 to create a scalable, multi-user architecture:

https://github.com/robtweed/qoper8-cp

Typically you'll use QOper8 with a JS Web framework such as Fastify, in which case also look at QOper8-Fastify which adds routing capabilities that integrate automatically with QOper8 workers:

https://github.com/robtweed/qoper8-fastify

or for even better performance use Bun's Bun.serve instead along with our mg-bun-router:

https://github.com/robtweed/mg-bun-router

Another alternative is to use our mg-web add-on for NGINX, Apache or IIS and its Javascript server plug-in:

https://github.com/chrisemunt/mg_web

https://github.com/chrisemunt/mg_web_js

together with our router:

https://github.com/robtweed/mg_web_router

So quite a range of technologies and options for working with Node.js and Bun.  If you want to learn more about how to use these technologies with IRIS, I'd recommend taking a look at our mg-showcase repository:

https://github.com/robtweed/mg-showcase

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