The official Node.js client library for EdgeDB

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The v1.0.0 version of this library was released on Oct 21, 2022. There are a number of new features and breaking changes, especially regarding the query builder workflow. Refer to the release notes for full information.

This is the official EdgeDB client library for JavaScript and TypeScript.

If you're just getting started with EdgeDB, we recommend going through the EdgeDB Quickstart first. This walks you through the process of installing EdgeDB, creating a simple schema, and writing some simple queries.

• Node.js 16+
  • We rely on global fetch being available, so you can bring your own polyfill and if you run Node 16, you'll need to run with the --experimental-fetch flag enabled.
• For TypeScript users:
  • TypeScript 4.4+ is required
  • yarn add @types/node --dev

npm install edgedb      # npm users
yarn add edgedb         # yarn users

EdgeDB 2.x requires v0.21.0 or later

• packages/driver: The edgedb client library.
• packages/generate: The @edgedb/generate package. Implements code generators, including edgeql-js and queries.
• packages/deno: The directory where the auto-generated deno.land/x/edgedb package is generated into. Both the driver and codegen tools are generated into this module.
• packages/edgeql-js: A skeleton package that prints an informative error message when npx edgeql-js is executed without edgedb installed.

The examples below demonstrate only the most fundamental use cases for this library. Go to the complete documentation site. >

A client is an instance of the Client class, which maintains a pool of connections to your database and provides methods for executing queries.

For TypeScript (and Node.js+ESM)

import * as edgedb from "edgedb";

const client = edgedb.createClient();

For Node.js (CommonJS)

const edgedb = require("edgedb");

const client = edgedb.createClient();

The call to edgedb.createClient() doesn't require arguments, as the library can determine how to connect to your database using the following mechanisms.

1. For local development: initialize a project with the edgedb project init command. As long as the file is within a project directory, createClient will be able to auto-discover the connection information of the project's associated instance. For more information on projects, follow the Using projects guide.

2. In production: configure the connection using environment variables. (This can also be used during local development if you prefer.) The easiest way is to set the EDGEDB_DSN variable; a DSN (also known as a "connection string") is a string of the form edgedb://USERNAME:PASSWORD@HOSTNAME:PORT/DATABASE.

For advanced cases, see the DSN specification and Reference > Connection Parameters.

The remainder of the documentation assumes you are using ES module (import) syntax.

import * as edgedb from "edgedb";

const client = edgedb.createClient();
await client.query("select 2 + 2"); // => [4]

Note that the result is an array. The .query() method always returns an array, regardless of the result cardinality of your query. If your query returns zero or one elements, use the .querySingle() instead.

// empty set, zero elements
await client.querySingle("select <str>{}"); // => null

// one element
await client.querySingle("select 2 + 2"); // => 4

// one element
await client.querySingle(
  `select Movie { title }
  filter .id = <uuid>'2eb3bc76-a014-45dc-af66-2e6e8cc23e7e';`
); // => { title: "Dune" }

Install the @edgedb/generate package as a dev dependency to take advantage of EdgeDB's built-in code generators.

npm install @edgedb/generate  --save-dev      # npm users
yarn add @edgedb/generate --dev               # yarn users

Then run a generator with the following command:

$ npx @edgedb/generate <generator> [FLAGS]

The following <generator>s are currently supported:

• queries: Generate typed functions from *.edgeql files
• edgeql-js: Generate the query builder

Run the following command to generate a source file for each *.edgeql system in your project.

$ npx @edgedb/generate queries

Assume you have a file called getUser.edgeql in your project directory.

// getUser.edgeql
select User {
  name,
  email
}
filter .email = <str>$email;

This generator will generate a getUser.query.ts file alongside it that exports a function called getUser.

import {createClient} from "edgedb";
import {myQuery} from "./myQuery.query";

const client = createClient();

const user = await myQuery(client, {name: "Timmy"});
user; // {name: string; email: string}

The first argument is a Client, the second is the set of parameters. Both the parameters and the returned value are fully typed.

The query builder lets you write queries in a code-first way. It automatically infers the return type of your queries.

To generate the query builder, install the edgedb package, initialize a project (if you haven't already), then run the following command:

$ npx @edgedb/generate edgeql-js

This will generate an EdgeQL query builder into the ./dbschema/edgeql-js directory, as defined relative to your project root.

For details on generating the query builder, refer to the complete documentation. Below is a simple select query as an example.

import { createClient } from "edgedb";
import e from "./dbschema/edgeql-js";

const client = createClient();
const query = e.select(e.Movie, (movie) => ({
  id: true,
  title: true,
  actors: { name: true },
  num_actors: e.count(movie.actors),
  filter_single: e.op(movie.title, "=", "Dune"),
}));

const result = await query.run(client);
result.actors[0].name; // => Timothee Chalamet

For details on using the query builder, refer to the full query builder docs.

Contributing to this library requires a local installation of EdgeDB. Install EdgeDB from here or build it from source.

$ git clone [email protected]:edgedb/edgedb-js.git
$ cd edgedb-js
$ yarn                           # install dependencies
$ yarn workspaces run build      # build all packages
$ yarn workspaces run test       # run tests for all packages

edgedb-js is developed and distributed under the Apache 2.0 license.