Readme · Migration · Advanced · TypeScript · Contributing
Find helpful concepts and tips about how to use this library.
- Using ES6 import
- Framework specifics
- Link resolution
- Note: link resolution for versions older than 10.0.0
- Note: link resolution for versions older than 7.0.0
- Sync
- Querying & Search parameters
You can use the es6 import with the SDK as follows:
import { createClient } from "contentful";
const client = createClient({...});OR
import * as contentful from "contentful";
const client = contentful.createClient({...});This library is able to handle Server Side Rendering and React Native. Depending on your implementation, you may need to explicitly require the browser or node variant of the library. (webpack usually is able to handle this on its own).
const contentful = require('contentful')
// will become the following to enforce the browser version
const contentful = require('contentful/dist/contentful.browser.min.js')This library is able to handle Server Side Rendering with Angular Universal. To use it, you will have to provide a custom Axios adapter, one example for Angular would be the ngx-axios-adapter.
In Contentful, you can create content that references other content. We call them "linked" or "referenced" entries. In contrast to a simple REST call, this library can render the content of a linked entry in place, using the contentful-resolve-response package. This enables what we call link resolution.
Example entry response without link resolution:
{
"sys": { ... },
"metadata": { ... },
"fields": {
"referencedEntry": {
"type": "Link",
"linkType": "Entry",
"id": "<referenced-entry-id>"
}
}
}
Example entry response with link resolution:
{
"sys": { ... },
"metadata": { ... },
"fields": {
"referencedEntry": {
"sys": { ... },
"metadata": { ... },
"fields": {
...
}
}
}
}
This makes parsing the response easier, and you don't need to manually extract every linked entry from the response object.
The link resolution is applied to one level deep by default. If you need it to be applied deeper, you may specify the include parameter when fetching your entries as follows client.getEntries( { include: <value> }). The include parameter can be set to a number up to 10, which would represent a ten layers deep link resolution.
We resolve links by default. If this behaviour is not what you want, you can use the chain modifier withoutLinkResolution on the Contentful client to keep the link objects instead of the inlined entries in your response object. See client chain modifiers.
Links which could not get resolved will be kept by default as UnresolvedLink. If you want to completely remove fields which could not be resolved, you can use the chain modifier withoutUnresolvableLinks.
Please see the notes below for link resolution prior to v.10.0.0 and v.7.0.0.
Please note that for versions older than 10.0.0, disabling link resolution needs to be done via configuration options during client creation.
To disable it, set resolveLinks to false when creating the Contentful client. Like so:
const contentful = require('contentful')
const client = contentful.createClient({
accessToken: '<you-access-token>',
space: '<your-space-id>',
resolveLinks: false,
})If you want to completely remove fields which could not be resolved, set removeUnresolved to true in the configuration options.
Please note that for versions older than 7.0.0, link resolution is only possible when requesting records from the collection endpoint using client.getEntries() or by performing an initial sync client.sync({ initial: true }). In case you want to request one entry and benefit from the link resolution you can use the collection end point with the following query parameter 'sys.id': '<your-entry-id>'.
Assuming that you have a Content Type post that has a reference field author:
const contentful = require('contentful')
const client = contentful.createClient({
accessToken: '<you-access-token>',
space: '<your-space-id>',
})
// getting a specific Post
client
.getEntries({ 'sys.id': '<entry-id>' })
.then((response) => {
// output the author name
console.log(response.items[0].fields.author.fields.name)
})
.catch((err) => console.log(err))The Sync API allows you to keep a local copy of all content in a space up-to-date via delta updates, meaning only changes that occurred since the last sync call.
Whenever you perform a sync operation the endpoint will send back a syncToken which you can use in a subsequent sync to only retrieve data which changed since the last call.
const contentful = require('contentful')
const client = contentful.createClient({
accessToken: '<you-access-token>',
space: '<your-space-id>',
})
// first time you are syncing make sure to specify `initial: true`
client
.sync({ initial: true })
.then((response) => {
// You should save the `nextSyncToken` to use in the following sync
console.log(response.nextSyncToken)
})
.catch((err) => console.log(err))The SDK will go through all the pages for you and give you back a response object with the full data so you don't need to handle pagination.
You may use syncing without pagination if you want to handle it on your own. To do this, you have to pass paginate: false as an option when calling sync. You manually have to take care to pass nextPageToken or nextSyncToken to your subsequent calls. The logic follows our sync API docs while you pass tokens instead of full urls.
const contentful = require('contentful')
const client = contentful.createClient({
accessToken: '<you-access-token>',
space: '<your-space-id>',
})
function customPaginatedSync(query) {
// Call sync, make sure you set paginate to false for every call
return client.sync(query, { paginate: false }).then((response) => {
// Do something with the respond. For example save result to disk.
console.log('Result of current sync page:', response.items)
// Sync finished when `nextSyncToken` is available
if (response.nextSyncToken) {
console.log('Syncing done. Start a new sync via ' + response.nextSyncToken)
return
}
// Otherwise, just continue to next page of the current sync run
return customPaginatedSync({ nextPageToken: response.nextPageToken })
})
}
customPaginatedSync({ initial: true }).then(() => console.log('Sync done'))You can pass your query parameters as key: value pairs in the query object whenever you request a resource. For example:
const contentful = require('contentful')
const client = contentful.createClient({
accessToken: '<you-access-token>',
space: '<your-space-id>',
})
// getting a specific Post
client
.getEntries({ 'sys.id': '<entry-id>' })
.then((response) => {
// output the author name
console.log(response.items[0].fields.author.fields.name)
})
.catch((err) => console.log(err))
// You can pass a query when requesting a single entity
client.getEntry('<entry-id>', { key: value })For more information about the search parameters, check the documentation.