How to insert an image into CouchDB - node.js

Question

I'm trying to figure out how to insert an image into CouchDB using the node-CouchDB library found here: https://www.npmjs.com/package/node-couchdb
Here's what I've done:
fs.readFile('download.jpeg', (err, data) => {
binary_data = new Buffer(data, 'binary');
couch.insertAttachment("node_db", doc_number, "download.jpeg", binary_data, rev_number).then(({data, headers, status}) => {
}, err => {
console.log("ERROR"+ err.code);
});
});
The result is that CouchDB stores this in the document format like such:
{
"_id": "2741d6f37d61d6bbdf63df3be5000504",
"_rev": "22-bfdbe6db35c7d9873a2cc8a38afb2833",
"_attachments": {
"attachment": {
"content_type": "application/json",
"revpos": 22,
"digest": "md5-on0A+d7045WPI6FyS1ut4g==",
"length": 22482,
"stub": true
}
}
}
//This is what the data looks like in CouchDB using the View Attachment Function through the interface:
{"type":"Buffer","data":[255,216,255,224,0,16,74,70,73,70,0,1,1,0,0,1,0,1,0,0,255,219,0,132,0,9,6,7,18,18,18,21,18,19,19,22,21,21,23,23,23,24,21,21,21,23,23,21,21,24,21,21,21,23,22,22,21,21,22,24,29,40,32,24,26,37,29,21,21,33,49,33,37,41,43,46,46,46,23,31,51,56,51,45,55,40,45,46,43,1,10,10,10,14,13,14,26,16,16,26,45,37,29,37,45,45,45,45,45,45,45,241,...]
I then tried changing the Content-Type attribute to "image/jpeg" in the header of the request resulting in:
{
"_id": "2741d6f37d61d6bbdf63df3be5000504",
"_rev": "23-cf8c2076b43082fdfe605cad68ef2355",
"_attachments": {
"attachment": {
"content_type": "image/jpeg",
"revpos": 23,
"digest": "md5-SaekQP37DCCeGX2M8UVeGQ==",
"length": 22482,
"stub": true
}
}
}
However, this still results in an image that isn't viewable from the CouchDB interface (clicking View Attachments). The image, in this case, is only size 6,904 bytes but it's being stored with a length of ~22k (inflating the size in CouchDB) so I'm assuming I'm not passing the correct representation (encoding) of the image to CouchDB.

Answer 1

You can encode your image data as a base64 string and save it, although i would not recommend it at all. What I would do is to upload the file to a object storage like AWS S3 or it's open source alternative MinIO, and then save in the DB just a reference to the file (e.g. an Image URL).
P.S.: I'm sorry about the lack of links and references in my answer, I'm writing it on my phone. I can edit it and include references as soon as I'm home.