"ref" in virtual property in mongoose 6

[pbadenski]

In Mongoose 5 we used to be able to use model instance in virtual "ref" property, see below:

const User = mongoose.model<User, UserModel>("User", UserSchema);

BlotterSchema.virtual("owner", {
  ref: User,
  localField: "userId",
  foreignField: "id",
  justOne: true
});

This doesn't seem to work in Mongoose 6 and you need specify ref as string: ref: "User". Has this feature been removed in Mongoose 6, or changed and we need to use it differently?

I checked both docs and changelog and can't really figure this one out...

[vkarpov15]

@pbadenski this feature hasn't been removed, we'll investigate and see if this is a bug.

Is the issue that TypeScript fails to compile or does it fail at runtime?

[pbadenski]

Thanks - TypeScript compiles it fine and then fails during runtime, not immediately though, but rather when I call populate, eg. blotter.populate("owner")

[vkarpov15]

Is there an error message?

[pbadenski]

Yes, see below:

 Use mongoose.model(name, schema)
     at NativeConnection.Connection.model (/Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/connection.js:1134:11)
     at addModelNamesToMap (/Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/helpers/populate/getModelsMapForPopulate.js:470:28)
     at _virtualPopulate (/Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/helpers/populate/getModelsMapForPopulate.js:434:7)
     at getModelsMapForPopulate (/Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/helpers/populate/getModelsMapForPopulate.js:40:12)
     at populate (/Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/model.js:4434:21)
     at _populate (/Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/model.js:4405:5)
     at /Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/model.js:4382:5
     at promiseOrCallback (/Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/helpers/promiseOrCallback.js:10:12)
     at Mongoose._promiseOrCallback (/Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/index.js:1151:10)
     at Function.Model.populate (/Users/pbadenski/workspace/xxx/api/node_modules/mongoose/lib/model.js:4380:23)