How to get cookie value in expressjs - node.js

Question

I'm using cookie-parser, all the tutorial talk about how to set cookie and the time it expiries but no where teach us how to get the value of these cookie

Answer 1

For people that stumble across this question, this is how I did it:
You need to install the express cookie-parser middleware as it's no longer packaged with express.
npm install --save cookie-parser
Then set it up as such:
const cookieParser = require("cookie-parser");
const app = express();
app.use(cookieParser());
Then you can access the cookies from
req.cookies
Hope that help.

Answer 2

First note that Cookies are sent to client with a server request and STORED ON THE CLIENT SIDE. Every time the user loads the website back, this cookie is sent with the request.
So you can access the cookie in client side (Eg. in your client side Java script) by using
document.cookie
you can test this in the client side by opening the console of the browser (F12) and type
console.log(document.cookie);
you can access the cookie from the server (in your case, expressjs) side by using
req.cookies
Best practice is to check in the client side whether it stored correctly. Keep in mind that not all the browsers are allowing to store cookies without user permission.
As per your comment, your code should be something like
var express = require('express');
var app = express();
var username ='username';
app.get('/', function(req, res){
res.cookie('user', username, {maxAge: 10800}).send('cookie set');
});
app.listen(3000);

Answer 3

hope this will help you
const app = require('express')();
app.use('/', (req, res) => {
var cookie = getcookie(req);
console.log(cookie);
});
function getcookie(req) {
var cookie = req.headers.cookie;
// user=someone; session=QyhYzXhkTZawIb5qSl3KKyPVN (this is my cookie i get)
return cookie.split('; ');
}
output
['user=someone', 'session=QyhYzXhkTZawIb5qSl3KKyPVN']

Answer 4

Just want to add that we shouldn't be using modules to do trivial stuff. Modules are very convenient and fast forward development, but keep us from learning by creating infrastructural code.
I'm a professor not a boss so I value more programmers knowledge/skill development than to write code in lesser time without learning anything...
Back to business...
Unless you need signed cookies, or anything more complex, it's perfectly possible to write your own middleware to parse cookies and add the values to the rest of the pipeline as the module does.
app.use((req, res, next) => {
const { headers: { cookie } } = req;
if (cookie) {
const values = cookie.split(';').reduce((res, item) => {
const data = item.trim().split('=');
return { ...res, [data[0]]: data[1] };
}, {});
res.locals.cookie = values;
}
else res.locals.cookie = {};
next();
});
Anywhere you need to read the cookie it's available via res.locals.cookie, conveniently formatted as an object.
You could even add a custom cryptography strategy here to make sure no one is reading your cookie.
Just remember middlewares are ordered, so this one has to be added before any other middleware or route that uses the cookie.