feathers-service

FeathersJS Service Scaffolding

A Feathers service is an object/class implementing standard CRUD methods (find, get, create, update, patch, remove, plus lifecycle setup/teardown). Services are transport-independent: the same method works over REST, websockets, or internal calls. Data-mutating methods (create/update/patch/remove) auto-emit real-time events (created/updated/patched/removed).

The official CLI (npx feathers generate service) produces four files per service. Prefer running the generator if the user has the CLI; otherwise reproduce this structure by hand. Always match the project's existing conventions (id type, database adapter, ESM vs CJS) — read a sibling service first.

Method → HTTP mapping

The four files

Replace Message/message/messages with the resource. messages is the path, message is the variable base, Message is the type. Pick the right id: SQL/Knex uses id: Type.Number(); MongoDB uses _id: ObjectIdSchema(). Read src/declarations.ts and an existing service to confirm.

1. <name>.class.ts — the service class

For a database-backed service, extend the adapter service rather than hand-writing CRUD. SQL/Knex example:

import type { Params } from '@feathersjs/feathers'
import { KnexService } from '@feathersjs/knex'
import type { KnexAdapterParams, KnexAdapterOptions } from '@feathersjs/knex'

import type { Application } from '../../declarations'
import type { Message, MessageData, MessagePatch, MessageQuery } from './messages.schema'

export type { Message, MessageData, MessagePatch, MessageQuery }

export interface MessageParams extends KnexAdapterParams<MessageQuery> {}

export class MessageService<ServiceParams extends Params = MessageParams> extends KnexService<
  Message,
  MessageData,
  MessageParams,
  MessagePatch
> {}

export const getOptions = (app: Application): KnexAdapterOptions => {
  return {
    paginate: app.get('paginate'),
    Model: app.get('postgresqlClient'), // or sqliteClient — match the project's db config key
    name: 'messages'
  }
}