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important

This is a contributors guide and NOT a user guide. Please visit these docs if you are using or evaluating SuperTokens.

TypeScript

  • Use typed strings as much as possible. For example, if a string variable can have a certain values, do not assign it type string, but instead use "val1" | "val2" ...

  • Use type instead of interfaces or namespace.

  • Classes must start with a capital letter, but variables with a small letter.

  • No switch statements, use if, else instead.

  • Camel case is preferred over using underscores.

  • Minimise use of old JS style coding:

  • Always use === and never ==

  • Always do explicit if checks. For example, if var1: string | undefined, do not do if (var1), instead, do if (var1 !== undefined). The only time something like if(var2) is acceptable, is when the type of var2: boolean.

  • if the return type of a function is an object, then specify the object's type in the function signature. If the object is used in several places, create a type for it in a types.ts file, and reference that.

  • If the return type of a function is an object that has a different structure based on the logic of the function, then use the | operator. For example, a return type can be:

    {status: "OK", name: string} | {status: "FAILED"} // good

    We prefer the above as opposed to

    {status: "OK" | "FAILED", name?: string} // bad

    because the second option expresses more possible types that what is possible - name will always be undefined if status: "FAILED".

    Also notice that we have a common field (status) across the different object types. This is necessary since if we don't have this, then the consumer of the return type would have a hard time knowing what the structure is.

  • Minimise the use of null. By convention, we prefer undefined over null.

  • Minimise the use of any and unknown. But if we must use these, we prefer using any.

  • Whenever creating an exportable module (to the user), we must allow them to import like:

    • import T from ".." and then do T.A()
    • import { A } from "..." and then do A()
  • We want to minimise the number of named types. Otherwise this can grow to a very long list, very quickly.

  • Miscellaneous functions like checkEmailFormat, or convertToBase64() can go into a utils.ts class. No need to create separate files for them.

  • Use @deprecated to deprecate functions and classes. When using this, make sure to use it in all functions that use the deprecated function as well (if applicable). If a user facing function needs to be deprecated, make sure to check that that's happening by using the playground.

Which frontend SDK do you use?
supertokens-web-js / mobile
supertokens-auth-react