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util

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promisify/callbackify

The promisify and callbackify APIs in Node.js provide a means of bridging between a Promise-based programming model and a callback-based model.

The promisify method allows taking a Node.js-style callback function and converting it into a Promise-returning async function:

import { promisify } from "node:util";

function foo(args, callback) {
	try {
		callback(null, 1);
	} catch (err) {
		// Errors are emitted to the callback via the first argument.
		callback(err);
	}
}

const promisifiedFoo = promisify(foo);
await promisifiedFoo(args);

Similarly to promisify, callbackify converts a Promise-returning async function into a Node.js-style callback function:

import { callbackify } from 'node:util';

async function foo(args) {
  throw new Error('boom');
}

const callbackifiedFoo = callbackify(foo);

callbackifiedFoo(args, (err, value) => {
  if (err) throw err;
});

callbackify and promisify make it easy to handle all of the challenges that come with bridging between callbacks and promises.

Refer to the Node.js documentation for callbackify ↗︎ and Node.js documentation for promisify ↗︎ for more information.

util.types

The util.types API provides a reliable and efficient way of checking that values are instances of various built-in types.

import { types } from "node:util";

types.isAnyArrayBuffer(new ArrayBuffer()); // Returns true
types.isAnyArrayBuffer(new SharedArrayBuffer()); // Returns true
types.isArrayBufferView(new Int8Array()); // true
types.isArrayBufferView(Buffer.from("hello world")); // true
types.isArrayBufferView(new DataView(new ArrayBuffer(16))); // true
types.isArrayBufferView(new ArrayBuffer()); // false
function foo() {
	types.isArgumentsObject(arguments); // Returns true
}
types.isAsyncFunction(function foo() {}); // Returns false
types.isAsyncFunction(async function foo() {}); // Returns true
// .. and so on

For more about util.types, refer to the Node.js documentation for util.types ↗︎.

util.MIMEType

util.MIMEType provides convenience methods that allow you to more easily work with and manipulate MIME types ↗︎. For example:

import { MIMEType } from "node:util";

const myMIME = new MIMEType("text/javascript;key=value");

console.log(myMIME.type);
// Prints: text

console.log(myMIME.essence);
// Prints: text/javascript

console.log(myMIME.subtype);
// Prints: javascript

console.log(String(myMIME));
// Prints: application/javascript;key=value

For more about util.MIMEType, refer to the Node.js documentation for util.MIMEType ↗︎.

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