This example shows how to implement a GraphQL server with TypeScript with the following stack:
- Apollo Server: HTTP server for GraphQL APIs
- GraphQL Nexus: GraphQL schema definition and resolver implementation
- GraphQL Shield: Authorization/permission layer for GraphQL schemas
- Prisma Client: Databases access (ORM)
- Prisma Migrate: Database migrations
- SQLite: Local, file-based SQL database
- Getting Started
- Using the GraphQL API
- Evolving the app
- Switch to another database (e.g. PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQL Server)
- Next steps
Download this example:
curl https://codeload.github.com/prisma/prisma-examples/tar.gz/latest | tar -xz --strip=2 prisma-examples-latest/typescript/graphql-auth
Install npm dependencies:
cd graphql-auth
npm install
Alternative: Clone the entire repo
Clone this repository:
git clone git@github.com:prisma/prisma-examples.git --depth=1
Install npm dependencies:
cd prisma-examples/typescript/graphql-auth
npm install
Run the following command to create your SQLite database file. This also creates the User
and Post
tables that are defined in prisma/schema.prisma
:
npx prisma migrate dev --name init
Now, seed the database with the sample data in prisma/seed.ts
by running the following command:
npx prisma db seed --preview-feature
Launch your GraphQL server with this command:
npm run dev
Navigate to http://localhost:4000 in your browser to explore the API of your GraphQL server in a GraphQL Playground.
The schema that specifies the API operations of your GraphQL server is defined in ./schema.graphql
. Below are a number of operations that you can send to the API using the GraphQL Playground.
Feel free to adjust any operation by adding or removing fields. The GraphQL Playground helps you with its auto-completion and query validation features.
query {
feed {
id
title
content
published
author {
id
name
email
}
}
}
See more API operations
You can send the following mutation in the Playground to sign up a new user and retrieve an authentication token for them:
mutation {
signup(name: "Sarah", email: "sarah@prisma.io", password: "HelloWorld42") {
token
}
}
This mutation will log in an existing user by requesting a new authentication token for them.
mutation {
login(email: "sarah@prisma.io", password: "HelloWorld42") {
token
}
}
If you seeded the database with sample data in step 2. of this README, you can use the following email
and password
combinations (from prisma/seed.ts
) for the login
mutation as well:
Password | |
---|---|
alice@prisma.io |
myPassword42 |
nilu@prisma.io |
random42 |
mahmoud@prisma.io |
iLikeTurtles42 |
For this query, you need to make sure a valid authentication token is sent along with the Bearer
-prefix in the Authorization
header of the request:
{
"Authorization": "Bearer __YOUR_TOKEN__"
}
With a real token, this looks similar to this:
{
"Authorization": "Bearer eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJ1c2VySWQiOiJjanAydHJyczFmczE1MGEwM3kxaWl6c285IiwiaWF0IjoxNTQzNTA5NjY1fQ.Vx6ad6DuXA0FSQVyaIngOHYVzjKwbwq45flQslnqX04"
}
Inside the Playground, you can set HTTP headers in the bottom-left corner:
Once you've set the header, you can send the following query to check whether the token is valid:
{
me {
id
name
email
}
}
You need to be logged in for this query to work, i.e. an authentication token that was retrieved through a signup
or login
mutation needs to be added to the Authorization
header in the GraphQL Playground.
mutation {
createDraft(
data: {
title: "Join the Prisma Slack"
content: "https://slack.prisma.io"
}
) {
id
published
}
}
You need to be logged in for this query to work, i.e. an authentication token that was retrieved through a signup
or login
mutation needs to be added to the Authorization
header in the GraphQL Playground. The authentication token must belong to the user who created the post.
mutation {
togglePublishPost(id: __POST_ID__) {
id
published
}
}
Note that you need to replace the __POST_ID__
placeholder with an actual id
from a Post
record in the database, e.g.5
:
mutation {
togglePublishPost(id: 5) {
id
published
}
}
{
feed(
searchString: "prisma"
) {
id
title
content
published
}
}
You need to be logged in for this query to work, i.e. an authentication token that was retrieved through a signup
or login
mutation needs to be added to the Authorization
header in the GraphQL Playground.
{
postById(id: __POST_ID__ ) {
id
title
content
published
}
}
Note that you need to replace the __POST_ID__
placeholder with an actual id
from a Post
record in the database, e.g.5
:
{
postById(id: 5 ) {
id
title
content
published
}
}
You need to be logged in for this query to work, i.e. an authentication token that was retrieved through a signup
or login
mutation needs to be added to the Authorization
header in the GraphQL Playground. The authentication token must belong to the user who created the post.
mutation {
deletePost(id: __POST_ID__) {
id
}
}
Note that you need to replace the __POST_ID__
placeholder with an actual id
from a Post
record in the database, e.g.5
:
mutation {
deletePost(id: 5) {
id
}
}
You need to be logged in for this query to work, i.e. an authentication token that was retrieved through a signup
or login
mutation needs to be added to the Authorization
header in the GraphQL Playground.
{
draftsByUser(
userUniqueInput: {
email: "mahmoud@prisma.io"
}
) {
id
title
content
published
author {
id
name
email
}
}
}
In this example, you authenticate your GraphQL requests using the Authorization
header field of the HTTP requests which are sent from clients to your GraphQL server. The required authentication token is returned by successful signup
and login
mutations.
Using the GraphQL Playground, the Authorization
header can be configured in the HTTP HEADERS tab in the bottom-left corner of the GraphQL Playground. The values for the HTTP headers are defined in JSON format. Note that the authentication token needs to be sent with the Bearer
-prefix:
{
"Authorization": "Bearer __YOUR_TOKEN__"
}
With a "real" authentication token, it looks similar to this:
{
"Authorization": "Bearer eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJ1c2VySWQiOiJjanAydHJyczFmczE1MGEwM3kxaWl6c285IiwiaWF0IjoxNTQzNTA5NjY1fQ.Vx6ad6DuXA0FSQVyaIngOHYVzjKwbwq45flQslnqX04"
}
As mentioned before, you can set HTTP headers in the bottom-left corner of the GraphQL Playground:
The following authorization rules are defined for the GraphQL API via GraphQL Shield:
Operation name | Operation type | Rule | Description |
---|---|---|---|
me |
Query | isAuthenticatedUser |
Requires a user to be authenticated |
draftsByUser |
Query | isAuthenticatedUser |
Requires a user to be authenticated |
postById |
Query | isAuthenticatedUser |
Requires a user to be authenticated |
createDraft |
Mutation | isAuthenticatedUser |
Requires a user to be authenticated |
deletePost |
Mutation | isPostOwner |
Requires the authenticated user to be the author of the post to be deleted |
incrementPostViewCount |
Mutation | isAuthenticatedUser |
Requires a user to be authenticated |
togglePublishPost |
Mutation | isPostOwner |
Requires the authenticated user to be the author of the post to be published/unpublished |
The isAuthenticatedUser
rule requires you to send a valid authentication token. The isPostOwner
rule additionaly requires the user to whom this authentication token belongs to be the author of the post on which the operation is applied.
Evolving the application typically requires two steps:
- Migrate your database using Prisma Migrate
- Update your application code
For the following example scenario, assume you want to add a "profile" feature to the app where users can create a profile and write a short bio about themselves.
The first step is to add a new table, e.g. called Profile
, to the database. You can do this by adding a new model to your Prisma schema file file and then running a migration afterwards:
// ./prisma/schema.prisma
model User {
id Int @default(autoincrement()) @id
name String?
email String @unique
posts Post[]
+ profile Profile?
}
model Post {
id Int @id @default(autoincrement())
createdAt DateTime @default(now())
updatedAt DateTime @updatedAt
title String
content String?
published Boolean @default(false)
viewCount Int @default(0)
author User? @relation(fields: [authorId], references: [id])
authorId Int?
}
+model Profile {
+ id Int @default(autoincrement()) @id
+ bio String?
+ user User @relation(fields: [userId], references: [id])
+ userId Int @unique
+}
Once you've updated your data model, you can execute the changes against your database with the following command:
npx prisma migrate dev --name add-profile
This adds another migration to the prisma/migrations
directory and creates the new Profile
table in the database.
You can now use your PrismaClient
instance to perform operations against the new Profile
table. Those operations can be used to implement queries and mutations in the GraphQL API.
First, add a new GraphQL type via Nexus' objectType
function:
// ./src/schema.ts
+const Profile = objectType({
+ name: 'Profile',
+ definition(t) {
+ t.nonNull.int('id')
+ t.string('bio')
+ t.field('user', {
+ type: 'User',
+ resolve: (parent, _, context) => {
+ return context.prisma.profile
+ .findUnique({
+ where: { id: parent.id || undefined },
+ })
+ .user()
+ },
+ })
+ },
+})
const User = objectType({
name: 'User',
definition(t) {
t.nonNull.int('id')
t.string('name')
t.nonNull.string('email')
t.nonNull.list.nonNull.field('posts', {
type: 'Post',
resolve: (parent, _, context) => {
return context.prisma.user
.findUnique({
where: { id: parent.id || undefined },
})
.posts()
},
+ t.field('profile', {
+ type: 'Profile',
+ resolve: (parent, _, context) => {
+ return context.prisma.user.findUnique({
+ where: { id: parent.id }
+ }).profile()
+ }
+ })
},
})
Don't forget to include the new type in the types
array that's passed to makeSchema
:
export const schema = makeSchema({
types: [
Query,
Mutation,
Post,
User,
+ Profile,
UserUniqueInput,
UserCreateInput,
PostCreateInput,
PostOrderBy,
DateTime,
],
// ... as before
}
Note that in order to resolve any type errors, your development server needs to be running so that the Nexus types can be generated. If it's not running, you can start it with npm run dev
.
// ./src/schema.ts
const Mutation = objectType({
name: 'Mutation',
definition(t) {
// other mutations
+ t.field('addProfileForUser', {
+ type: 'Profile',
+ args: {
+ userUniqueInput: nonNull(
+ arg({
+ type: 'UserUniqueInput',
+ }),
+ ),
+ bio: stringArg()
+ },
+ resolve: async (_, args, context) => {
+ return context.prisma.profile.create({
+ data: {
+ bio: args.bio,
+ user: {
+ connect: {
+ id: args.userUniqueInput.id || undefined,
+ email: args.userUniqueInput.email || undefined,
+ }
+ }
+ }
+ })
+ }
+ })
}
})
Finally, you can test the new mutation like this:
mutation {
addProfileForUser(
userUniqueInput: {
email: "mahmoud@prisma.io"
}
bio: "I like turtles"
) {
id
bio
user {
id
name
}
}
}
Expand to view more sample Prisma Client queries on Profile
Here are some more sample Prisma Client queries on the new Profile
model:
const profile = await prisma.profile.create({
data: {
bio: 'Hello World',
user: {
connect: { email: 'alice@prisma.io' },
},
},
})
const user = await prisma.user.create({
data: {
email: 'john@prisma.io',
name: 'John',
profile: {
create: {
bio: 'Hello World',
},
},
},
})
const userWithUpdatedProfile = await prisma.user.update({
where: { email: 'alice@prisma.io' },
data: {
profile: {
update: {
bio: 'Hello Friends',
},
},
},
})
If you want to try this example with another database than SQLite, you can adjust the the database connection in prisma/schema.prisma
by reconfiguring the datasource
block.
Learn more about the different connection configurations in the docs.
Expand for an overview of example configurations with different databases
For PostgreSQL, the connection URL has the following structure:
datasource db {
provider = "postgresql"
url = "postgresql://USER:PASSWORD@HOST:PORT/DATABASE?schema=SCHEMA"
}
Here is an example connection string with a local PostgreSQL database:
datasource db {
provider = "postgresql"
url = "postgresql://janedoe:mypassword@localhost:5432/notesapi?schema=public"
}
For MySQL, the connection URL has the following structure:
datasource db {
provider = "mysql"
url = "mysql://USER:PASSWORD@HOST:PORT/DATABASE"
}
Here is an example connection string with a local MySQL database:
datasource db {
provider = "mysql"
url = "mysql://janedoe:mypassword@localhost:3306/notesapi"
}
Here is an example connection string with a local Microsoft SQL Server database:
datasource db {
provider = "sqlserver"
url = "sqlserver://localhost:1433;initial catalog=sample;user=sa;password=mypassword;"
}
Because SQL Server is currently in Preview, you need to specify the previewFeatures
on your generator
block:
generator client {
provider = "prisma-client-js"
previewFeatures = ["microsoftSqlServer"]
}
- Check out the Prisma docs
- Share your feedback in the
prisma2
channel on the Prisma Slack - Create issues and ask questions on GitHub
- Watch our biweekly "What's new in Prisma" livestreams on Youtube