Scope and context

This is the official documentation of the @forestadmin/agent Node.js agent.

Actions can have 3 different scopes: Single, Bulk, and Global.

The scope of an action defines how it can be triggered and which records it will target.

-	Single	Bulk	Global
Targeted records	One at a time	All selected and matching the current segment / search	Your choice among all matching the current segment / search
Can be triggered from the List View	When a single record is selected	When one or more records are selected	✅
Can be triggered from the Details View or Summary View	✅	✅	🚫

The context object

The context object is central to writing Actions controllers in Forest Admin.

It is the bridge between all the data that your agent has access to and the action's execution. It is passed to the execute function as the first argument and provides access to the following properties:

• getRecord(fieldNames) (or getRecords(fieldNames) for Bulk and Global Actions)

• getRecordId() (or getRecordIds() for Bulk and Global Actions)

• collection the collection on which the action is declared, which can be queried using the Forest Admin Query Interface.

• dataSource the composite data source who contains all your collections, which can be queried using the Forest Admin Query Interface

• filter a filter that can be used to query the collection, and which is based on action scope and the list of selected records.

• caller an object containing information about the user who is performing the action (see details below)

• hasFieldChanged(fieldName) the name of the field who has changed in the UI. See an example of usage

changedField was deprecated in favor of hasFieldChanged(fieldName) starting from @forestadmin/[email protected] see more information in this issue report ↗.

The caller object

The caller object contains information about the current user performing the action:

Property	Description
id	User ID
email	User email
firstName	First name
lastName	Last name
team	Team name
role	Role name
tags	Custom tags (key-value pairs)
timezone	User timezone

Error methods

The context also provides methods to throw errors that will be displayed in the Forest Admin UI:

Method	Description
throwValidationError(message)	Display a validation error
throwForbiddenError(message)	Display a forbidden error
throwError(message)	Display a generic error

Example 1: Getting data from the selected records

We can simply use the getRecord(fieldNames) method to get any column from the selected record or a relation.

agent.customizeCollection('customers', collection =>
  collection.addAction('Call me John in the server logs', {
    scope: 'Single',
    execute: async context => {
      // use getRecords() for Bulk and Global Actions
      const { firstName } = await context.getRecord(['firstName']);

      if (firstName === 'John') {
        console.log('Hi John!');
      } else {
        console.error('You are not John!');
      }
    },
  }),
);

Example 2: Updating a field of the selected record

For simple queries, use context.collection and context.filter to query the collection.

Those are instances of objects from the Forest Admin Query Interface.

agent.customizeCollection('companies', collection =>
  collection.addAction('Mark as live', {
    scope: 'Single',
    execute: async context => {
      await context.collection.update(context.filter, { live: true });
    },
  }),
);

Example 3: Coding any business logic

Forest Admin does not impose any restriction on the handler: you are free to write the execute handler to fit your use case.

You are free to call external APIs, query your database, or perform any work in action handlers.

import axios from 'axios';

agent.customizeCollection('companies', collection =>
  collection.addAction('Mark as live', {
    scope: 'Single',
    execute: async context => {
      const url = 'http://my-api.com/mark-as-live';
      const params = { id: await context.getRecordId() };

      await axios.post(url, params);
    },
  }),
);