Question

I have a notifications system for my website (set up in Node.js) and I’m using an MVC pattern. In my controllers, I do a check if there’s a flash message:

  if flashMessages = req.flash()
    if flashMessages.gritterMsgs
      for flashMessage in flashMessages.gritterMsgs

The only issue is I have to do this for every controller and every function within that controller. Is there someway to include this once (perhaps as middleware)?

Answer 1

Express already has view helpers, you can setup the session and flash objects for views like so:

app.dynamicHelpers({
  session: function(req, res){
    return req.session;
  },
  flash: function(req, res){
    return req.flash();
  }
});

Then in your views you can directly use the flash object (which is set in the controller like so: req.flash = "my flash stuff".

Here’s an example: https://github.com/alessioalex/Nodetuts/blob/master/express_samples/app.js