Payload from post request not available in node.js function - node.js

Question

I've just started to fiddle with three new (to me) frameworks/products: MongoDB, NodeJS and AngularJS.
What I'm trying to accomplish is to have a simple form submit a value and have that value written to the database. I've gotten to a point where my value is submitted using $http.post in my Angular app and I do get my node.js backend function called but my req parameter (se below) in undefined. From Google Chromes Network monitor I can see that a POST request is submitted and that the payload contains the value I've entered.
I really don't understand why it's not available in the receiving end. Please help.
Now for some snippets (not the entire files):
server.js:
var express = require('express'),
menu = require('./routes/menu'),
http = require('http'),
app = express(),
httpServer = http.createServer(app),
bodyParser = require('body-parser');
app.use(bodyParser.json());
app.set('port', 3000);
app.use(express.static(__dirname));
app.get('/menuItems', menu.getMenuItems);
app.post('/menuItems', function(req, res) { console.log(req); });
httpServer.listen(app.get('port'), function () {
console.log("Express server listening on port %s.", httpServer.address().port);
});
menu.js:
exports.addMenuItem = function(req, res) {
var menuItem = req.body; <===req.body is undefined
console.log('Adding menuItem: ' + JSON.stringify(menuItem));
db.collection('menuItems', function(err, collection) {
collection.insert(menuItem, {safe:true}, function(err, result) {
if (err) {
res.send({'error':'An error has occurred'});
} else {
console.log('Success: ' + JSON.stringify(result[0]));
res.send(result[0]);
}
});
});
};
app.js:
(function () {
var app = angular.module('jdk', []);
app.controller('MenuItemController', function ($scope, $http) {
$scope.processForm = function () {
$http.post('/menuItems', JSON.stringify($scope.formData))
.success(function (data) {
console.log(data);
});
};
});
})();
I think I've dome everything but apparently not. I also tried installing and using 'body-paarser' in my server.js but the result was the same.
When my server crashes it dumps something like this:
{ _readableState:
{ highWaterMark: 16384,
buffer: [],
length: 0,
pipes: null,
pipesCount: 0,
flowing: false,
ended: false,
endEmitted: false,
reading: false,
calledRead: false,
sync: true,
needReadable: false,
emittedReadable: false,
readableListening: false,
objectMode: false,
defaultEncoding: 'utf8',
ranOut: false,
awaitDrain: 0,
readingMore: false,
oldMode: false,
decoder: null,
encoding: null },
readable: true,
domain: null,
_events: {},
_maxListeners: 10,
socket:
{ _connecting: false,
_handle:
{ fd: null,
writeQueueSize: 0,
owner: [Circular],
onread: [Function: onread],
reading: true },
_readableState:
{ highWaterMark: 16384,
buffer: [],
length: 0,
pipes: null,
pipesCount: 0,
flowing: false,
ended: false,
endEmitted: false,
reading: true,
calledRead: true,
sync: false,
needReadable: true,
emittedReadable: false,
readableListening: false,
objectMode: false,
defaultEncoding: 'utf8',
ranOut: false,
awaitDrain: 0,
readingMore: false,
oldMode: false,
decoder: null,
encoding: null },
readable: true,
domain: null,
_events:
{ end: [Object],
finish: [Function: onSocketFinish],
_socketEnd: [Function: onSocketEnd],
drain: [Object],
timeout: [Function],
error: [Object],
close: [Object] },
_maxListeners: 10,
_writableState:
{ highWaterMark: 16384,
objectMode: false,
needDrain: false,
ending: false,
ended: false,
finished: false,
decodeStrings: false,
defaultEncoding: 'utf8',
length: 0,
writing: false,
sync: false,
bufferProcessing: false,
onwrite: [Function],
writecb: null,
writelen: 0,
buffer: [],
errorEmitted: false },
writable: true,
allowHalfOpen: true,
onend: [Function],
destroyed: false,
bytesRead: 2496,
_bytesDispatched: 157759,
_pendingData: null,
_pendingEncoding: '',
server:
{ domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
_connections: 6,
connections: [Getter/Setter],
_handle: [Object],
_usingSlaves: false,
_slaves: [],
allowHalfOpen: true,
httpAllowHalfOpen: false,
timeout: 120000,
_connectionKey: '4:0.0.0.0:3000' },
_idleTimeout: 120000,
_idleNext:
{ _connecting: false,
_handle: [Object],
_readableState: [Object],
readable: true,
domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
_writableState: [Object],
writable: true,
allowHalfOpen: true,
onend: [Function],
destroyed: false,
bytesRead: 375,
_bytesDispatched: 1410,
_pendingData: null,
_pendingEncoding: '',
server: [Object],
_idleTimeout: 120000,
_idleNext: [Object],
_idlePrev: [Circular],
_idleStart: 1406644394348,
parser: [Object],
ondata: [Function],
_paused: false,
_httpMessage: null },
_idlePrev: { _idleNext: [Circular], _idlePrev: [Object] },
_idleStart: 1406644399010,
parser:
{ _headers: [],
_url: '',
onHeaders: [Function: parserOnHeaders],
onHeadersComplete: [Function: parserOnHeadersComplete],
onBody: [Function: parserOnBody],
onMessageComplete: [Function: parserOnMessageComplete],
socket: [Circular],
incoming: [Circular],
maxHeaderPairs: 2000,
onIncoming: [Function] },
ondata: [Function],
_paused: false,
_httpMessage:
{ domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
output: [],
outputEncodings: [],
writable: true,
_last: false,
chunkedEncoding: false,
shouldKeepAlive: true,
useChunkedEncodingByDefault: true,
sendDate: true,
_headerSent: false,
_header: '',
_hasBody: true,
_trailer: '',
finished: false,
_hangupClose: false,
socket: [Circular],
connection: [Circular],
_headers: [Object],
_headerNames: [Object],
req: [Circular],
locals: {} } },
connection:
{ _connecting: false,
_handle:
{ fd: null,
writeQueueSize: 0,
owner: [Circular],
onread: [Function: onread],
reading: true },
_readableState:
{ highWaterMark: 16384,
buffer: [],
length: 0,
pipes: null,
pipesCount: 0,
flowing: false,
ended: false,
endEmitted: false,
reading: true,
calledRead: true,
sync: false,
needReadable: true,
emittedReadable: false,
readableListening: false,
objectMode: false,
defaultEncoding: 'utf8',
ranOut: false,
awaitDrain: 0,
readingMore: false,
oldMode: false,
decoder: null,
encoding: null },
readable: true,
domain: null,
_events:
{ end: [Object],
finish: [Function: onSocketFinish],
_socketEnd: [Function: onSocketEnd],
drain: [Object],
timeout: [Function],
error: [Object],
close: [Object] },
_maxListeners: 10,
_writableState:
{ highWaterMark: 16384,
objectMode: false,
needDrain: false,
ending: false,
ended: false,
finished: false,
decodeStrings: false,
defaultEncoding: 'utf8',
length: 0,
writing: false,
sync: false,
bufferProcessing: false,
onwrite: [Function],
writecb: null,
writelen: 0,
buffer: [],
errorEmitted: false },
writable: true,
allowHalfOpen: true,
onend: [Function],
destroyed: false,
bytesRead: 2496,
_bytesDispatched: 157759,
_pendingData: null,
_pendingEncoding: '',
server:
{ domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
_connections: 6,
connections: [Getter/Setter],
_handle: [Object],
_usingSlaves: false,
_slaves: [],
allowHalfOpen: true,
httpAllowHalfOpen: false,
timeout: 120000,
_connectionKey: '4:0.0.0.0:3000' },
_idleTimeout: 120000,
_idleNext:
{ _connecting: false,
_handle: [Object],
_readableState: [Object],
readable: true,
domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
_writableState: [Object],
writable: true,
allowHalfOpen: true,
onend: [Function],
destroyed: false,
bytesRead: 375,
_bytesDispatched: 1410,
_pendingData: null,
_pendingEncoding: '',
server: [Object],
_idleTimeout: 120000,
_idleNext: [Object],
_idlePrev: [Circular],
_idleStart: 1406644394348,
parser: [Object],
ondata: [Function],
_paused: false,
_httpMessage: null },
_idlePrev: { _idleNext: [Circular], _idlePrev: [Object] },
_idleStart: 1406644399010,
parser:
{ _headers: [],
_url: '',
onHeaders: [Function: parserOnHeaders],
onHeadersComplete: [Function: parserOnHeadersComplete],
onBody: [Function: parserOnBody],
onMessageComplete: [Function: parserOnMessageComplete],
socket: [Circular],
incoming: [Circular],
maxHeaderPairs: 2000,
onIncoming: [Function] },
ondata: [Function],
_paused: false,
_httpMessage:
{ domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
output: [],
outputEncodings: [],
writable: true,
_last: false,
chunkedEncoding: false,
shouldKeepAlive: true,
useChunkedEncodingByDefault: true,
sendDate: true,
_headerSent: false,
_header: '',
_hasBody: true,
_trailer: '',
finished: false,
_hangupClose: false,
socket: [Circular],
connection: [Circular],
_headers: [Object],
_headerNames: [Object],
req: [Circular],
locals: {} } },
httpVersion: '1.1',
complete: false,
headers:
{ host: 'localhost:3000',
connection: 'keep-alive',
'content-length': '19',
accept: 'application/json, text/plain, */*',
origin: 'http://localhost:3000',
'user-agent': 'Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/36.0.1985.125 Safari/537.36',
'content-type': 'application/json;charset=UTF-8',
referer: 'http://localhost:3000/admin/',
'accept-encoding': 'gzip,deflate,sdch',
'accept-language': 'en,da;q=0.8,nb;q=0.6,sv;q=0.4' },
trailers: {},
_pendings: [],
_pendingIndex: 0,
url: '/menuItems',
method: 'POST',
statusCode: null,
client:
{ _connecting: false,
_handle:
{ fd: null,
writeQueueSize: 0,
owner: [Circular],
onread: [Function: onread],
reading: true },
_readableState:
{ highWaterMark: 16384,
buffer: [],
length: 0,
pipes: null,
pipesCount: 0,
flowing: false,
ended: false,
endEmitted: false,
reading: true,
calledRead: true,
sync: false,
needReadable: true,
emittedReadable: false,
readableListening: false,
objectMode: false,
defaultEncoding: 'utf8',
ranOut: false,
awaitDrain: 0,
readingMore: false,
oldMode: false,
decoder: null,
encoding: null },
readable: true,
domain: null,
_events:
{ end: [Object],
finish: [Function: onSocketFinish],
_socketEnd: [Function: onSocketEnd],
drain: [Object],
timeout: [Function],
error: [Object],
close: [Object] },
_maxListeners: 10,
_writableState:
{ highWaterMark: 16384,
objectMode: false,
needDrain: false,
ending: false,
ended: false,
finished: false,
decodeStrings: false,
defaultEncoding: 'utf8',
length: 0,
writing: false,
sync: false,
bufferProcessing: false,
onwrite: [Function],
writecb: null,
writelen: 0,
buffer: [],
errorEmitted: false },
writable: true,
allowHalfOpen: true,
onend: [Function],
destroyed: false,
bytesRead: 2496,
_bytesDispatched: 157759,
_pendingData: null,
_pendingEncoding: '',
server:
{ domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
_connections: 6,
connections: [Getter/Setter],
_handle: [Object],
_usingSlaves: false,
_slaves: [],
allowHalfOpen: true,
httpAllowHalfOpen: false,
timeout: 120000,
_connectionKey: '4:0.0.0.0:3000' },
_idleTimeout: 120000,
_idleNext:
{ _connecting: false,
_handle: [Object],
_readableState: [Object],
readable: true,
domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
_writableState: [Object],
writable: true,
allowHalfOpen: true,
onend: [Function],
destroyed: false,
bytesRead: 375,
_bytesDispatched: 1410,
_pendingData: null,
_pendingEncoding: '',
server: [Object],
_idleTimeout: 120000,
_idleNext: [Object],
_idlePrev: [Circular],
_idleStart: 1406644394348,
parser: [Object],
ondata: [Function],
_paused: false,
_httpMessage: null },
_idlePrev: { _idleNext: [Circular], _idlePrev: [Object] },
_idleStart: 1406644399010,
parser:
{ _headers: [],
_url: '',
onHeaders: [Function: parserOnHeaders],
onHeadersComplete: [Function: parserOnHeadersComplete],
onBody: [Function: parserOnBody],
onMessageComplete: [Function: parserOnMessageComplete],
socket: [Circular],
incoming: [Circular],
maxHeaderPairs: 2000,
onIncoming: [Function] },
ondata: [Function],
_paused: false,
_httpMessage:
{ domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
output: [],
outputEncodings: [],
writable: true,
_last: false,
chunkedEncoding: false,
shouldKeepAlive: true,
useChunkedEncodingByDefault: true,
sendDate: true,
_headerSent: false,
_header: '',
_hasBody: true,
_trailer: '',
finished: false,
_hangupClose: false,
socket: [Circular],
connection: [Circular],
_headers: [Object],
_headerNames: [Object],
req: [Circular],
locals: {} } },
_consuming: false,
_dumped: false,
httpVersionMajor: 1,
httpVersionMinor: 1,
upgrade: false,
next: [Function: next],
baseUrl: '',
originalUrl: '/menuItems',
_parsedUrl:
{ protocol: null,
slashes: null,
auth: null,
host: null,
port: null,
hostname: null,
hash: null,
search: null,
query: null,
pathname: '/menuItems',
path: '/menuItems',
href: '/menuItems' },
params: {},
query: {},
res:
{ domain: null,
_events: { finish: [Function] },
_maxListeners: 10,
output: [],
outputEncodings: [],
writable: true,
_last: false,
chunkedEncoding: false,
shouldKeepAlive: true,
useChunkedEncodingByDefault: true,
sendDate: true,
_headerSent: false,
_header: '',
_hasBody: true,
_trailer: '',
finished: false,
_hangupClose: false,
socket:
{ _connecting: false,
_handle: [Object],
_readableState: [Object],
readable: true,
domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
_writableState: [Object],
writable: true,
allowHalfOpen: true,
onend: [Function],
destroyed: false,
bytesRead: 2496,
_bytesDispatched: 157759,
_pendingData: null,
_pendingEncoding: '',
server: [Object],
_idleTimeout: 120000,
_idleNext: [Object],
_idlePrev: [Object],
_idleStart: 1406644399010,
parser: [Object],
ondata: [Function],
_paused: false,
_httpMessage: [Circular] },
connection:
{ _connecting: false,
_handle: [Object],
_readableState: [Object],
readable: true,
domain: null,
_events: [Object],
_maxListeners: 10,
_writableState: [Object],
writable: true,
allowHalfOpen: true,
onend: [Function],
destroyed: false,
bytesRead: 2496,
_bytesDispatched: 157759,
_pendingData: null,
_pendingEncoding: '',
server: [Object],
_idleTimeout: 120000,
_idleNext: [Object],
_idlePrev: [Object],
_idleStart: 1406644399010,
parser: [Object],
ondata: [Function],
_paused: false,
_httpMessage: [Circular] },
_headers: { 'x-powered-by': 'Express' },
_headerNames: { 'x-powered-by': 'X-Powered-By' },
req: [Circular],
locals: {} },
route:
{ path: '/menuItems',
stack: [ [Object] ],
methods: { post: true } } }

Answer 1

you need to use the https://www.npmjs.org/package/body-parser module to parse the body of POST request.
app.use(express.static(__dirname));
// parse application/x-www-form-urlencoded
app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({ extended: false }))
// parse application/json
app.use(bodyParser.json())
app.get('/menuItems', menu.getMenuItems);