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Version: 4.x

Your First Route

The database is now filled with some stories. Let's implement the first route to retrieve them.

API endpointMethodDescription
/api/storiesGETLists the stories of all users. An optional query parameter authorId can be provided to filter the stories to be returned.

First, generate the story controller.

foal generate controller api/stories --register

A new file appears in the api subdirectory. Open it and replace its contents.

import { Context, Delete, Get, HttpResponseCreated, HttpResponseNoContent, HttpResponseNotFound, HttpResponseOK, Post, UserRequired, ValidateBody, ValidatePathParam, ValidateQueryParam } from '@foal/core';
import { Story, User } from '../../entities';

export class StoriesController {
@Get()
@ValidateQueryParam('authorId', { type: 'number' }, { required: false })
async readStories(ctx: Context) {
const authorId = ctx.request.query.authorId as number|undefined;

let queryBuilder = Story
.createQueryBuilder('story')
.leftJoinAndSelect('story.author', 'author')
.select([
'story.id',
'story.title',
'story.link',
'author.id',
'author.name'
]);

if (authorId !== undefined) {
queryBuilder = queryBuilder.where('author.id = :authorId', { authorId });
}

const stories = await queryBuilder.getMany();

return new HttpResponseOK(stories);
}
}

The readStories method retrieves and returns the stories along with some information about their authors.

When requesting this endpoint, the response body will look like this:

[
{
"id": 1,
"title": "How to build a simple to-do list",
"link": "https://foalts.org/docs/tutorials/simple-todo-list/1-installation",
"author": {
"id": 1,
"name": "John"
}
},
{
"id": 2,
"title": "FoalTS architecture overview",
"link": "https://foalts.org/docs/architecture/architecture-overview",
"author": {
"id": 2,
"name": "Mary"
}
},
{
"id": 3,
"title": "Authentication with Foal",
"link": "https://foalts.org/docs/authentication/quick-start",
"author": {
"id": 2,
"name": "Mary"
}
},
]