ljharb / ljharb/qs

Different array parse behaviour of x-www-form-urlencoded between ExpressJS and rails

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bug help wanted parse
Dominant language
JavaScript
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Description

I use content-type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded to send POST request to backend server. The post body as follow:

listing[pictures][files][][name]=9ADDD7B1-FCFF-4538-916A-1E63DFB43A72&
listing[pictures][files][][name]=EFFE67B2-5D41-4B74-A33E-5963F54FAEC7&
listing[pictures][files][][name]=BBC9CB38-FE01-4F1A-AE37-7ED71F4B2CB5

In backend server, if I use ruby on rails, the POST will be parsed as follow:

"pictures"=>{
    "files"=>[
        {"name"=>"9ADDD7B1-FCFF-4538-916A-1E63DFB43A72"}, 
        {"name"=>"EFFE67B2-5D41-4B74-A33E-5963F54FAEC7"}, 
        {"name"=>"BBC9CB38-FE01-4F1A-AE37-7ED71F4B2CB5"}
    ]
}

This result is what I expected to be.

But, If I use nodeJS express and body-parser:

// parse application/json
app.use(bodyParser.json());
// parse application/x-www-form-urlencoded
app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({ extended: true }));

extended: true means that bodyParser will use qs to parse data.

The POST will be parsed as follow:

"pictures"=>{
    "files"=>[
        "name"=>[
            "9ADDD7B1-FCFF-4538-916A-1E63DFB43A72", 
            "EFFE67B2-5D41-4B74-A33E-5963F54FAEC7", 
            "BBC9CB38-FE01-4F1A-AE37-7ED71F4B2CB5"
        ]
    ]
}

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First steps

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  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start by reproducing the supplied repeated-key payload through qs and bodyParser.urlencoded({ extended: true }), then compare its structure with the Rails result. Trace how the nested array notation is interpreted and establish whether the expected array-of-objects shape can be supported or should be documented.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
express, javascript, nodejs, rails
Domain
backend
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
3/5
Estimated time
1-2 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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