fs.writeFile in a promise, asynchronous-synchronou

Question

I need some help with my code. I'm new at nodejs and have a lot of trouble with it. What i'm trying to do:

• 1)fetch a .txt with Amazon products(ASIN's)

• 2)fetch all products with the amazon-product-api package

• 3)save each product in a .json file

My code is not working. I think i messed up with this asynchronous-synchronous stuff - help me!

var amazon = require('amazon-product-api');
var fs = require('fs');

var client = amazon.createClient({
    awsId: "XXX",
    awsSecret: "XXX",
    awsTag: "888"
});

var array = fs.readFileSync('./test.txt').toString().split('\n');
for (var i = 1; i < array.length; i++) {
     var ASIN = array[i];

    return client.itemLookup({
            domain: 'webservices.amazon.de',
            responseGroup: 'Large',
            idType: 'ASIN',
            itemId: ASIN
        })
        .then(function(results) {
            fs.writeFile(ASIN + '.json', JSON.stringify(results), function(err) {
                if (err) {
                    console.log(err);
                } else {
                    console.log("JSON saved");
                }
            })

            return results;

        }).catch(function(err) {
            console.log(err);
        });
};

Answer 1

Because fs.writefile is a traditional asynchronous callback - you need to follow the promise spec and return a new promise wrapping it with a resolve and rejection handler like so:

return new Promise(function(resolve, reject) {
    fs.writeFile("<filename.type>", data, '<file-encoding>', function(err) {
        if (err) reject(err);
        else resolve(data);
    });
});

So in your code you would use it like so right after your call to .then()

 .then(function(results) {
    return new Promise(function(resolve, reject) {
            fs.writeFile(ASIN + '.json', JSON.stringify(results), function(err) {
               if (err) reject(err);
               else resolve(data);
            });
    });
  }).then(function(results) {
       console.log("results here: " + results)
  }).catch(function(err) {
       console.log("error here: " + err);
  });

Answer 2

say

const util = require('util')
const fs_writeFile = util.promisify(fs.writeFile)

https://nodejs.org/api/util.html#util_util_promisify_original

this is less prone to bugs than the top-voted answer

Answer 3

As of 2018...

...the correct answer is to use async/await with the native fs module. Upgrade to Node.js 10 (already supported by major cloud providers) and do this:

const fs = require('fs').promises;

// This must run inside a function marked `async`:
const file = await fs.readFile('filename.txt', 'utf8');
await fs.writeFile('filename.txt', 'test');

Do not use third-party packages and do not write your own wrappers, that's not necessary anymore.

As of Node 11.1.0, you will get a warning that this feature is experimental, but it works just fine and it's the way to go in the future.

Answer 4

const util = require('util')
const fs = require('fs');

const fs_writeFile = util.promisify(fs.writeFile)

fs_writeFile('message.txt', 'Hello Node.js')
    .catch((error) => {
        console.log(error)
    });

Answer 5

For easy to use asynchronous convert all callback to promise use some library like "bluebird" .

      .then(function(results) {
                fs.writeFile(ASIN + '.json', JSON.stringify(results), function(err) {
                    if (err) {
                        console.log(err);
                    } else {
                        console.log("JSON saved");
                        return results;
                    }
                })


            }).catch(function(err) {
                console.log(err);
            });

Try solution with promise (bluebird)

var amazon = require('amazon-product-api');
var fs = require('fs');
var Promise = require('bluebird');

var client = amazon.createClient({
    awsId: "XXX",
    awsSecret: "XXX",
    awsTag: "888"
});


var array = fs.readFileSync('./test.txt').toString().split('\n');
Promise.map(array, function (ASIN) {
    client.itemLookup({
        domain: 'webservices.amazon.de',
        responseGroup: 'Large',
        idType: 'ASIN',
        itemId: ASIN
    }).then(function(results) {
        fs.writeFile(ASIN + '.json', JSON.stringify(results), function(err) {
            if (err) {
                console.log(err);
            } else {
                console.log("JSON saved");
                return results;
            }
        })
    }).catch(function(err) {
        console.log(err);
    });
});

Answer 6

Update Sept 2017: fs-promise has been deprecated in favour of fs-extra.

---

I haven't used it, but you could look into fs-promise. It's a node module that:

Proxies all async fs methods exposing them as Promises/A+ compatible promises (when, Q, etc). Passes all sync methods through as values.