Generate a unique ObjectId for a collection - node.js

I would like to generate a unique ObjectId for a resource to give back clients with the nodejs mongodb driver.
IE:
var ObjectID = require('mongodb').ObjectID;
var objectId = new ObjectID();
Reading about an ObjectId it seems that there are some cases in which this id may not be unique. Even though this is extremely rare I still cannot take a chance on having a duplicate id.
Question #1, Using this driver is it possible (even though unlikely) to get a duplicate id doing this:
var objectId = new ObjectID();
Question #2 (if above is not 100% guarantee to give a unique id):
Does this driver guarantee that for a certain collection the ObjectId that is automatically created when a new document is inserted is unique? If yes, how? If yes, can I somehow duplicate that behavior when calling new ObjectID() myself without a collection?
If the driver or the mongo server ensures (100% of the time) that for a collection every new doc gets a unique id, I could always have a collection of just ids, then when generating a new, empty doc for that collection I would ensure I get a unique ObjectId. However seems like overkill to have another collection just to store ids.
That being said some might ask why not just generate the ObjectId in a collection and update that doc later with data. The answer is that in my case data may not ever come later and I don't want to implement logic to check for empty docs that only contain an id.

It's very unlikely that the same ObjectID will generate as mongo guarantees unique ID. objectID is created with a combination of two same values and two different values (unix epoch time, and a random value). However, in any case of a duplicate, you won't be allowed to insert a document as objectID acts as a primary key and insert function will return duplicate key error to your callback. Read more here. The same error is returned if mongo node native library creates a duplicate ObjectID.
UPDATE: again after reading the code base, if "hypothetically" the objectID that was generated by the library isn't unique, the answer is no. We are not ensured by the library that the id is unique, but we are ensured of a duplicate error doesn't matter who or what sent the id.
Here's the process:
1. generates ID
2. Sends straight to server.
3. Returns results.
Mongo isn't looping in nodeJS with existing ids because the library isn't storing it in cache. Read the code base for the library.

Related

How can I retrieve the id of a document I added to a Cosmosdb collection?

I have a single collection into which I am inserting documents of different types. I use the type parameter to distinguish between different datatypes in the collection. When I am inserting a document, I have created an Id field for every document, but Cosmosdb has a built-in id field.
How can I insert a new document and retrieve the id of the created Document all in one query?
The CreateDocumentAsync method returns the created document so you should be able to get the document id.
Document created = await client.CreateDocumentAsync(collectionLink, order);
I think you just need to .getResource() method to get the create document obj.
Please refer to the java code:
DocumentClient documentClient = new DocumentClient(END_POINT,
MASTER_KEY, ConnectionPolicy.GetDefault(),
ConsistencyLevel.Session);
Document document = new Document();
document.set("name","aaa");
document = documentClient.createDocument("dbs/db/colls/coll",document,null,false).getResource();
System.out.println(document.toString());
//then do your business logic with the document.....
C# code:
Parent p = new Parent
{
FamilyName = "Andersen.1",
FirstName = "Andersen",
};
Document doc = client.CreateDocumentAsync("dbs/db/colls/coll",p,null).Result.Resource;
Console.WriteLine(doc);
Hope it helps you.
Sure, you could always fetch the id from creation method response in your favorite API as already shown in other answers. You may have reasons why you want to delegate key-assigning to DocumentDB, but to be frank, I don't see any good ones.
If inserted document would have no id set DocumentDB would generate a GUID for you. There wouldn't be any notable difference compared to simply generating a new GUID yourself and assign it into id-field before save. Self-assigning the identity would let you simplify your code a bit and also let you use the identity not only after persisting but also BEFORE. Which could simplify a lot of scenarios you may have or run into in future.
Also, note that you don't have to use GUIDs as as id and could use any unique value you already have. Since you mentioned you have and Id field (which by name, I assume to be a primary key) then you should consider reusing this instead introducing another set of keys.
Self-assigned non-Guid key is usually a better choice since it can be designed to match your data and application needs better than a GUID. For example, in addition to being just unique, it may also be a natural key, narrower, human-readable, ordered, etc.

Adding extra value at Model.create with Mongoose

I have a large array that comes in from an API that I'd like to store straight into MongoDB.
Model.create(largeArray) ... // many documents created
The problem is, I have one additional key:value pair that I need to set for all documents in that array. It's a user id, and many documents are created for a given user once per API call. So for a given Model.create call, the user id is the same for every doc in the array.
Without mapping over the array, is there an efficient way of adding a field with a consistent value? Something like Model.create(myLargeArray, {userId: someUserId}) would be ideal, but I know this isn't the case with the Mongoose API.
function addDocsForUser(largeArray, someUserId) {
// each element of largeArray needs to have `userId: someUserId` added to it
return Model.create(largeArray)
}

Generating ID locally to avoid auto creation by mongodb

Is there a way to generate an ID for a new document?
Something like
var newID = mongoose.Types.ObjectId();
// some random code that may involve db operations.
db.Model.create({_id: newID, otherProperties: {}})
When I write something like this, actual ID of the created document is always slightly larger than the newID. Is there anyway to use the newID exactly?
You should not create ID attribute for mongodb documents, It will automatically generate an ID attribute to all documents when we create them.
e.x
db.users.insert({name:'kasun',email:'kasun#gmail',address:'2street,colombo'})
this will crete an attribute called _id for the document of kasun.It is unique.Therefore don't set id attribute manually.

what's the best way to bind a mongodb doc to a node.js html page

In past with my PHP / Rails - MYSQL apps I've used the unique ID of a table record to keep track of a record in an html file.
So I'd keep track of how to delete a record shown like this (15 being the ID of the record):
Delete this record
So now I'm using MongoDB. I've tried the same method but the objectID ._id attribute seems to be a loooong byte string that I can't use conveniently.
What's the most sensible way of binding a link in the view to a record (for deletion, or other purposes or whatever)?
If the answer is to create a new id that's unique for each document in the collection, then what's the best way to generate those unique id's?
Thank you.
You could use a counter instead of the ObjectID
But this could create a problem when inserting a new document after you deleted a previous one.
See this blog post for more detail info on Sequential unique identifiers with Node.js and MongoDB.
Or you could use the timestamp part of the ObjectID:
objectId.getTimestamp().toString()
See the node objectid docs

Mongoose.js: is it possible to change name of ObjectId?

Some question about mongo ObjectId in mongoose
1) Can be ObjectId field by named not as _id? And How to do that? When I do in my code:
MySchema = new mongoose.Schema({
id : mongoose.Schema.ObjectId
});
it changes nothing.
2) If I have objectId field called _id is it possible to return from request another name for this field (for example just "id" - to send it on the in web response);
3) And question just for understanding: why is the ObjectId _id field accessible through "id" property not "_id"?
Thanks, Alex
The "_id" element is part of the mongodb architecture which guarantee that every document in a collection can be uniquely identified. This is especially important if you use sharding to allow unique identifier across disparate machine. Therefore this is a design choice so there is no way to get ride of it :)
The default value for _id are generated as follows:
timestamp
hash of the machine hostname
pid of the generating process
increment
but you can use whatever value you want as long is unique.
If it's easier for you think about the _id of something which has to be there, but you really don't care about :) Just leave the system to auto generate it and use your own identifier.
So if you still wanna create your own "id" execute something like that:
db.mySchema.ensureIndex({"id": 1}, {"unique" : true})
but make sure that is really unique and it doesn't conflict with the API you use.
2) Rename it on the application side, just before sending it as the web response.
3) I think this is because of the API you use. Maybe the author found it more logical to return the id instead of _id ? Honestly never tried mongoose :)

Resources