This article was updated June 15, 2018. This series and associated repository use Angular 6, CLI 6, RxJS 6, and revised recommendations regarding the storage of sensitive data.

TL;DR: This 8-part tutorial series covers building and deploying a full-stack JavaScript application from the ground up with hosted MongoDB, Express, Angular, and Node.js (MEAN stack). The completed code is available in the mean-rsvp-auth0 GitHub repo and a deployed sample app is available at https://rsvp.kmaida.net. Part 3 of the tutorial series covers fetching data from MongoDB with a Node API and displaying and filtering it with Angular.

Real-World Angular Series

You can view all sections of the tutorial series here:

Part 3: Fetching and Displaying API Data

The second part of this tutorial covered authentication, authorization, feature planning, and data modeling.

The third installment in the series covers fetching data from MongoDB with a Node API and displaying and filtering the data with Angular.

API: Fetching Events

Let's pick up right where we left off last time. We have data in our database, so it's time to retrieve it with the API. We'll start by writing four endpoints that will get data from MongoDB:

List of public events starting in the future

List of all public and private events (admin access required)

Event details (authentication required)

List of RSVPs associated with an event (authentication required)

Open up the server api.js file and let's begin.

GET Future Public Events

We'll start with an /api/events endpoint that retrieves all public events with a start date in the future from the events collection.

Recall that we already created and required our Event and Rsvp mongoose schema in Part 2: Data Modeling. We can now use those schema to execute MongoDB collection methods with mongoose.

Add the following code to the API Routes section of the api.js file:

// server/api.js ... /* |-------------------------------------- | API Routes |-------------------------------------- */ const _eventListProjection = 'title startDatetime endDatetime viewPublic'; // GET list of public events starting in the future app.get('/api/events', (req, res) => { Event.find({viewPublic: true, startDatetime: { $gte: new Date() }}, _eventListProjection, (err, events) => { let eventsArr = []; if (err) { return res.status(500).send({message: err.message}); } if (events) { events.forEach(event => { eventsArr.push(event); }); } res.send(eventsArr); }); }); ...

This endpoint does not require any authentication. We'll pass the find() query as {viewPublic: true, startDatetime: { $gte: new Date() } because we only want public events with a starting datetime greater than or equal to now.

We also want to pass a projection (see first example in this doc). Projections state which fields we want returned in the documents that match our query. If no projection is specified, all fields are returned. In our case, we don't need descriptions or locations in main event listings, so our projection will contain only the properties we do want returned.

In the callback, we'll handle errors and iterate over any results, pushing them to an array that will be returned. We want an empty array if there are no events, since a lack of event documents simply means none have been created yet. Pretty straightforward!

GET All Public and Private Events

Next we'll create a similar endpoint that will return all events: /api/events/admin . This time, we want authentication and admin privileges before we'll send any data. We can implement this like so:

// server/api.js ... // GET list of all events, public and private (admin only) app.get('/api/events/admin', jwtCheck, adminCheck, (req, res) => { Event.find({}, _eventListProjection, (err, events) => { let eventsArr = []; if (err) { return res.status(500).send({message: err.message}); } if (events) { events.forEach(event => { eventsArr.push(event); }); } res.send(eventsArr); }); }); ...

The code for this endpoint is very similar to the route fetching public events, but we'll include both the jwtCheck and adminCheck middleware. We won't add any parameters to the query object because we want to retrieve all events in the database. We'll pass the same _eventListProjection to leave out locations and descriptions.

Note: It's worthwhile to note that this endpoint is simply for admin display purposes. We want the admin to be able to see and interact with a listing of public and private events. However, authenticated users can still see private event details too, they just need to have the direct link and can't stumble across them from a listing.

GET Event Details

Now we'll fetch an event by ID with an /api/event/:id endpoint:

// server/api.js ... // GET event by event ID app.get('/api/event/:id', jwtCheck, (req, res) => { Event.findById(req.params.id, (err, event) => { if (err) { return res.status(500).send({message: err.message}); } if (!event) { return res.status(400).send({message: 'Event not found.'}); } res.send(event); }); }); ...

This authorized endpoint needs to have a parameter passed to it when called. The parameter should be the event ID so we can use the findById() method. If no event is found matching the ID we passed, we'll send a bad request error. Otherwise, we'll return the event.

GET RSVPs for an Event

Finally, we'll retrieve a list of all the RSVPs for a specific event: /api/event/:eventId/rsvps . RSVPs in our app are transparent to all authenticated users; many people want to know if their friends are attending the same events they are.

// server/api.js ... // GET RSVPs by event ID app.get('/api/event/:eventId/rsvps', jwtCheck, (req, res) => { Rsvp.find({eventId: req.params.eventId}, (err, rsvps) => { let rsvpsArr = []; if (err) { return res.status(500).send({message: err.message}); } if (rsvps) { rsvps.forEach(rsvp => { rsvpsArr.push(rsvp); }); } res.send(rsvpsArr); }); }); ...

We'll find RSVPs by matching the eventId , which will be passed with the request as a parameter. We want to return an array whether or not there are RSVPs, since a lack of RSVPs does not indicate an error.

Angular: Fetching Events

Now that we have API routes for fetching events, we need to access these routes in our Angular app so we can display events data.

Add HTTP Client Module to App Module

First we'll need to import the HttpClientModule in our App module. Open the app.module.ts file:

... import { HttpClientModule } from '@angular/common/http'; ... @NgModule({ ... imports: [ ..., HttpClientModule ], ... }) ...

Import HttpClientModule and include it in the imports array of the NgModule.

Create API Service

Now we'll create an API service. Let's generate the service now:

$ ng g service core/api

This command creates a file called api.service.ts in the src/app/core folder. Open the service and add the following code:

// src/app/core/api.service.ts import { Injectable } from '@angular/core'; import { HttpClient, HttpHeaders, HttpErrorResponse } from '@angular/common/http'; import { AuthService } from './../auth/auth.service'; import { throwError as ObservableThrowError, Observable } from 'rxjs'; import { catchError } from 'rxjs/operators'; import { ENV } from './env.config'; import { EventModel } from './models/event.model'; import { RsvpModel } from './models/rsvp.model'; @Injectable() export class ApiService { constructor( private http: HttpClient, private auth: AuthService ) { } private get _authHeader(): string { return `Bearer ${this.auth.accessToken}`; } // GET list of public, future events getEvents$(): Observable<EventModel[]> { return this.http .get<EventModel[]>(`${ENV.BASE_API}events`) .pipe( catchError((error) => this._handleError(error)) ); } // GET all events - private and public (admin only) getAdminEvents$(): Observable<EventModel[]> { return this.http .get<EventModel[]>(`${ENV.BASE_API}events/admin`, { headers: new HttpHeaders().set('Authorization', this._authHeader) }) .pipe( catchError((error) => this._handleError(error)) ); } // GET an event by ID (login required) getEventById$(id: string): Observable<EventModel> { return this.http .get<EventModel>(`${ENV.BASE_API}event/${id}`, { headers: new HttpHeaders().set('Authorization', this._authHeader) }) .pipe( catchError((error) => this._handleError(error)) ); } // GET RSVPs by event ID (login required) getRsvpsByEventId$(eventId: string): Observable<RsvpModel[]> { return this.http .get<RsvpModel[]>(`${ENV.BASE_API}event/${eventId}/rsvps`, { headers: new HttpHeaders().set('Authorization', this._authHeader) }) .pipe( catchError((error) => this._handleError(error)) ); } private _handleError(err: HttpErrorResponse | any): Observable<any> { const errorMsg = err.message || 'Error: Unable to complete request.'; if (err.message && err.message.indexOf('No JWT present') > -1) { this.auth.login(); } return ObservableThrowError(errorMsg); } }

We'll need to make unauthenticated and authenticated requests, so we'll import HttpClient and HttpHeaders (to add the Authorization header with access token) along with HttpErrorResponse . We also need AuthService to prompt login if no JWT is found when attempting to make an authenticated request. We'll create streams with our API calls so we'll import Observable and ObservableThrowError , as well as the pipeable catchError operator from RxJS. We need ENV from our environment config to get the appropriate API URIs. Finally, in order to declare the types for our event streams, we need the models ( EventModel and RsvpModel ) we created earlier.

Once HttpClient and AuthService are added to the constructor, we can use the HTTP methods to create observables of API data. We expect to receive streams of type EventModel[] (an array of events) for our two event list endpoints, a single EventModel when retrieving event details by ID, and RsvpModel[] when retrieving all RSVPs for an event.

In order to make authenticated requests, we'll need to set an Authorization header using the access token stored in local storage from the authentication service we created in Angular: Basic Authentication in Part 2. We'll create an accessor method called _authHeader to return the necessary Authorization value with the currently stored access token. The token may change if authentication is silently renewed during a session (we'll implement silent token renewal much later), so we'll fetch it from the service on each request to ensure its validity.

If we need to pass parameters to the request, such as with the getEventById$(id) and getRsvpsByEventId$(eventId) methods, we'll specify the arguments when calling the endpoint from our components. Our HttpClient methods (e.g., get() , post() , etc.) accept a parameter that uses an instance of HttpHeaders().set() to add authorization to that request. You can read more about this in the Angular Http Docs here.

Finally, we'll handle errors. A successful API call returns the response as the body (in our case, this returns JSON). This does not require any mapping on our end as of Angular v4.3. A failed call checks the error message and prompts a fresh login if necessary, canceling the observable and producing an error if something else went wrong.

Provide API Service in App Module

We want our API service to be available throughout our app, so let's provide it in our app.module.ts :

// src/app/app.module.ts ... import { ApiService } from './core/api.service'; ... @NgModule({ ... providers: [ ..., ApiService ], ... }) ...

We can now import the service in any of our components to use its methods.

Create a Loading Component

Since we'll be making asynchronous API calls, it's ideal to also have a loading state. Alternatively, we could use route resolve to prevent routes from loading until the necessary API data has been returned, but this can give an app the appearance of sluggishness while navigating. Instead, we'll show a loading icon with a very simple component.

Generate the loading component like so:

$ ng g component core/loading --is --it --flat

We want this to be a single-file component, so we'll set a few options with the Angular CLI:

--is : alias for --inline-styles

: alias for --it : alias for --inline-template

: alias for --flat : do not generate a containing directory

Now let's grab a suitable loading image. You easily can make your own at loading.io, or you can download this one:

We'll create an images directory inside our src/assets folder and place the loading icon there.

Then we'll open our loading.component.ts and add the markup and a few simple styles:

// src/app/core/loading.component.ts import { Component } from '@angular/core'; @Component({ selector: 'app-loading', template: ` <img src="/assets/images/loading.svg"> `, styles: [` :host { display: block; } img { display: block; margin: 20px auto; width: 50px; } `] }) export class LoadingComponent { }

We can remove the OnInit functionality and the constructor function. The template is very simple: just the host element with an image. We can style the host element using the special selector :host . (The host element is the component's custom element, <app-loading> in this case.)

Add Loading Component to Callback Component

Let's replace the Loading... text in our callback component with our new loading component. Open the callback.component.html file and replace its contents with the following:

<!-- src/app/pages/callback/callback.component.html --> <app-loading></app-loading>

Now we'll see the spinner after the login redirect instead of plain text. We'll also use the loading component when making API calls across other components.

Angular: Create a Utility Service

Before we start building out our components, let's make a utility service that we can build on throughout development.

Run the following command to generate the boilerplate:

$ ng g service core/utils

We'll begin using this service to add an isLoaded() utility. Then we'll create methods to manage the display of event dates. Each event has a start datetime and an end datetime. Start and end dates for a single event may be different days or the same day. We want a way to collapse same-day events into one date when displaying them in the UI. We also don't need to show times on the main listings, only on detail pages. Finally, we'll want a way to determine if an event already happened and is now in the past.

We'll import and take advantage of Angular's built-in DatePipe to help us craft some helper methods:

// src/app/core/utils.service.ts import { Injectable } from '@angular/core'; import { DatePipe } from '@angular/common'; @Injectable() export class UtilsService { constructor(private datePipe: DatePipe) { } isLoaded(loading: boolean): boolean { return loading === false; } eventDates(start, end): string { // Display single-day events as "Jan 7, 2018" // Display multi-day events as "Aug 12, 2017 - Aug 13, 2017" const startDate = this.datePipe.transform(start, 'mediumDate'); const endDate = this.datePipe.transform(end, 'mediumDate'); if (startDate === endDate) { return startDate; } else { return `${startDate} - ${endDate}`; } } eventDatesTimes(start, end): string { // Display single-day events as "1/7/2018, 5:30 PM - 7:30 PM" // Display multi-day events as "8/12/2017, 8:00 PM - 8/13/2017, 10:00 AM" const _shortDate = 'M/d/yyyy'; const startDate = this.datePipe.transform(start, _shortDate); const startTime = this.datePipe.transform(start, 'shortTime'); const endDate = this.datePipe.transform(end, _shortDate); const endTime = this.datePipe.transform(end, 'shortTime'); if (startDate === endDate) { return `${startDate}, ${startTime} - ${endTime}`; } else { return `${startDate}, ${startTime} - ${endDate}, ${endTime}`; } } eventPast(eventEnd): boolean { // Check if event has already ended const now = new Date(); const then = new Date(eventEnd.toString()); return now >= then; } }

First we need to import the DatePipe from @angular/common . We'll add it to the constructor function's parameters.

Note: We also need to provide DatePipe in our app.module.ts if we want to be able to use it here. We'll add it when we provide our UtilsService .

The isLoaded() method uses an expression to check if the loading argument strictly evaluates to false . We'll be using a loading property in each component to track the state of API calls. This lets us know if we've received some kind of response from the API endpoint, since loading would be undefined otherwise. This helps ensure that we don't reveal the wrong UI state in our templates.

The eventDates() method accepts start and end dates, then uses the date pipe to transform the dates into user-friendly strings. If the start and end dates are the same, only one date is returned. If they're different, the dates are returned as a range.

The eventDatesTimes() method does something very similar, but with times as well.

Lastly, the eventPast() method accepts an eventEnd parameter and compares it to the current datetime, outputting a boolean that informs us if the event has already ended.

Provide Date Pipe and Utility Service in App Module

We can now import and provide the date pipe and our utility service in the app module. Open the app.module.ts file and make the following updates:

// src/app/app.module.ts ... import { DatePipe } from '@angular/common'; import { UtilsService } from './core/utils.service'; ... @NgModule({ ..., providers: [ ..., DatePipe, UtilsService ], ... }) ...

We're now ready to use our new utilities in components. We'll add more methods to this handy service as we need them throughout development.

Angular: Create a Filter/Sort Service

Our app is going to need several different ways to organize arrays of data. In AngularJS, we would have used built-in filters for this, such as filter and orderBy . Angular uses pipes to transform data, but no longer provides out-of-the-box pipes for filtering or sorting for reasons cited here.

Due to the performance and minification impacts of this choice, we will not create custom pipes to implement filtering or sorting functionality. This would simply re-introduce the same problems the Angular team was attempting to solve by removing these filters. Instead, the appropriate approach is to use services.

Throughout the development of our app, we'll add additional methods for searching, filtering, and sorting. For now, we'll start with three: searching ( search() and noSearchResults() ) and sorting by date ( orderByDate() ).

Run the following command to generate a service with the Angular CLI:

$ ng g service core/filter-sort

Open the new filter-sort.service.ts file and add:

// src/app/core/filter-sort.service.ts import { Injectable } from '@angular/core'; import { DatePipe } from '@angular/common'; @Injectable() export class FilterSortService { constructor(private datePipe: DatePipe) { } private _objArrayCheck(array: any[]): boolean { // Checks if the first item in the array is an object // (assumes same-shape for all array items) // Necessary because some arrays passed in may have // models that don't match {[key: string]: any}[] // This check prevents uncaught reference errors const item0 = array[0]; const check = !!(array.length && item0 !== null && Object.prototype.toString.call(item0) === '[object Object]'); return check; } search(array: any[], query: string, excludeProps?: string|string[], dateFormat?: string) { // Match query to strings and Date objects / ISO UTC strings // Optionally exclude properties from being searched // If matching dates, can optionally pass in date format string if (!query || !this._objArrayCheck(array)) { return array; } const lQuery = query.toLowerCase(); const isoDateRegex = /\d{4}-\d{2}-\d{2}T\d{2}:\d{2}:\d{2}.\d{3}Z/; // ISO UTC const dateF = dateFormat ? dateFormat : 'medium'; const filteredArray = array.filter(item => { for (const key in item) { if (item.hasOwnProperty(key)) { if (!excludeProps || excludeProps.indexOf(key) === -1) { const thisVal = item[key]; if ( // Value is a string and NOT a UTC date typeof thisVal === 'string' && !thisVal.match(isoDateRegex) && thisVal.toLowerCase().indexOf(lQuery) !== -1 ) { return true; } else if ( // Value is a Date object or UTC string (thisVal instanceof Date || thisVal.toString().match(isoDateRegex)) && // https://angular.io/api/common/DatePipe // Matching date format string passed in as param (or default to 'medium') this.datePipe.transform(thisVal, dateF).toLowerCase().indexOf(lQuery) !== -1 ) { return true; } } } } }); return filteredArray; } noSearchResults(arr: any[], query: string): boolean { // Check if array searched by query returned any results return !!(!arr.length && query); } orderByDate(array: any[], prop: string, reverse?: boolean) { // Order an array of objects by a date property // Default: ascending (1992->2017 | Jan->Dec) if (!prop || !this._objArrayCheck(array)) { return array; } const sortedArray = array.sort((a, b) => { const dateA = new Date(a[prop]).getTime(); const dateB = new Date(b[prop]).getTime(); return !reverse ? dateA - dateB : dateB - dateA; }); return sortedArray; } }

First we need to import the DatePipe from @angular/common . We'll add it to the constructor function's parameters.

Note: We already provided DatePipe in our app.module.ts when we implemented our UtilsService .

Then we'll create a private _objArrayCheck() method to ensure that the array we're trying to search or sort contains objects. If it doesn't, uncaught reference errors will be produced, so we'd like a way to prevent this.

The search() method accepts the array of objects to be filtered, a query to search for, any optional properties we want to exclude from searching (either a single property string or an array of properties), and optionally, a date format string.

The dateFormat should be one of the formats from the Angular DatePipe. This allows users to search for dates that are much less readable in the raw data. The developer can determine which format they want to be able to query. For example, if UTC date strings or JavaScript Date objects are transformed, the user can query for Jan and receive results with a value that is actually 2017-01-07T15:00:00.000Z in the data.

Note: It's advisable to match the dateFormat to any date pipe used in the display of the data being searched. That way, users can see the way dates are displayed in your listing and this can inform the way they structure their query.

If the query is falsey, we'll return the unfiltered array. Otherwise, we'll set the query to lowercase, since our search should be case-insensitive (we'll do the same to the values we're querying). Since UTC dates are recognized as strings and not Dates in JavaScript, we'll use a regular expression to differentiate them from other strings. If no dateFormat parameter is passed in, we'll default to medium (e.g., Sep 3, 2010, 12:05:08 PM for US).

Next, we'll filter the array using the filter() array method. We'll iterate over each property in each object in the array, first making sure that the object contains the property with the hasOwnProperty() method. If the key doesn't match anything passed in excludeProps , we'll check the value for matches to the query.

This is done differently for various value types. The search handles strings, JavaScript Date objects, and UTC strings. If we want to ensure that the search doesn't query certain properties, we'll make sure to pass them in as excludedProps when calling the method in our components.

Note: We won't search properties with values that are any other types because our RSVP app doesn't need this. If you'd like to see a more robust implementation that handles strings, numbers, booleans, and dates, please check out this filter-sort service Gist on GitHub.

The noSearchResults() method simply accepts an array and a query and returns true if the array is empty and a query is present.

Our orderByDate() method accepts an array of objects, the property containing the date value we want to sort by, and an optional reverse argument to change the sort order from ascending to descending.

If no property is passed, the array is returned unsorted.

Note: As written, this method expects an array of objects because this is how our data is structured in the RSVP app. An array of dates will not be sorted. You can easily update this method to support more robust array sorting if needed for other apps.

We can then use the sort() array method to re-order the array by date timestamp.

Provide FilterSort Service in App Module

Now we'll import and provide the FilterSortService in the app module. Open the app.module.ts file and make the following updates:

// src/app/app.module.ts ... import { FilterSortService } from './core/filter-sort.service'; ... @NgModule({ ..., providers: [ ..., FilterSortService ], ... }) ...

We can now search as well as sort our event arrays by date in our components.

Angular: Home Component Event List

Our components should get and display lists of events. We've already created the API endpoints to return this data and implemented an API service to fetch it. Now we need to subscribe to and display it in our components.

Add Forms Module to App Module

The first thing we'll need to do is add the FormsModule to our App module to allow us to use NgModel in our templates for the search form field. Open the app.module.ts file:

// src/app/app.module.ts ... import { FormsModule } from '@angular/forms'; ... @NgModule({ ..., imports: [ ..., FormsModule ], ... }) ...

Import FormsModule and add it to the imports array in the NgModule.

Show Public Events in Home Component

Let's update our Home component to show the public upcoming events list. Open home.component.ts :

// src/app/pages/home/home.component.ts import { Component, OnInit, OnDestroy } from '@angular/core'; import { Title } from '@angular/platform-browser'; import { ApiService } from './../../core/api.service'; import { UtilsService } from './../../core/utils.service'; import { FilterSortService } from './../../core/filter-sort.service'; import { Subscription } from 'rxjs'; import { EventModel } from './../../core/models/event.model'; @Component({ selector: 'app-home', templateUrl: './home.component.html', styleUrls: ['./home.component.scss'] }) export class HomeComponent implements OnInit, OnDestroy { pageTitle = 'Events'; eventListSub: Subscription; eventList: EventModel[]; filteredEvents: EventModel[]; loading: boolean; error: boolean; query: ''; constructor( private title: Title, public utils: UtilsService, private api: ApiService, public fs: FilterSortService ) { } ngOnInit() { this.title.setTitle(this.pageTitle); this._getEventList(); } private _getEventList() { this.loading = true; // Get future, public events this.eventListSub = this.api .getEvents$() .subscribe( res => { this.eventList = res; this.filteredEvents = res; this.loading = false; }, err => { console.error(err); this.loading = false; this.error = true; } ); } searchEvents() { this.filteredEvents = this.fs.search(this.eventList, this.query, '_id', 'mediumDate'); } resetQuery() { this.query = ''; this.filteredEvents = this.eventList; } ngOnDestroy() { this.eventListSub.unsubscribe(); } }

When we use subscriptions in our components, we should always take care to unsubscribe from them in the OnDestroy lifecycle hook, so we'll import OnDestroy and ensure that our HomeComponent class implements it and also has an ngOnDestroy() method.

We'll also import our API, utilities, and filter/sort services, as well as Subscription and the EventModel . We'll change the pageTitle to Events and declare properties for the event list API call subscription, event list results, and filtered events (for search results), which should have a type matching an array of EventModel s. In order to handle loading state and errors, we'll need a loading property and an error property to inform our UI what to display. Finally, we need a member to store our search query .

The eventListSub subscription is called in our ngOnInit() lifecycle hook using a private _getEventList() method. In this method, we'll set loading to true while we make the API call. Then we'll subscribe to the api.getEvents$() observable from our API service. When we receive items in the stream, we'll use that response to set the local eventList property and the initial filteredEvents . We'll also set loading to false and handle errors.

The searchEvents() method calls the search() method from our filter/sort service and passes the appropriate parameters to it. We don't want the search to check the event _id so we'll pass that as excludeProps . Our events are going to be displayed in the template with the mediumDate date format, so we'll also pass that to the search() method.

We want to be able to reset the query with a button in the template, so the resetQuery() method sets the query property to an empty string and resets the filteredEvents array back to the initial eventList acquired in the API call.

Finally, we'll unsubscribe from eventListSub in the ngOnDestroy() lifecycle method.

Home Component Template

Now open the home.component.html template:

<!-- src/app/pages/home/home.component.html --> <h1 class="text-center">{{ pageTitle }}</h1> <app-loading *ngIf="loading"></app-loading> <ng-template [ngIf]="utils.isLoaded(loading)"> <ng-template [ngIf]="eventList"> <ng-template [ngIf]="eventList.length"> <!-- Search events --> <label class="sr-only" for="search">Search</label> <div class="search input-group mb-3"> <div class="input-group-prepend"> <div class="input-group-text">Search</div> </div> <input id="search" type="text" class="form-control" [(ngModel)]="query" (keyup)="searchEvents()" /> <span class="input-group-append"> <button class="btn btn-danger" (click)="resetQuery()" [disabled]="!query">×</button> </span> </div> <!-- No search results --> <p *ngIf="fs.noSearchResults(filteredEvents, query)" class="alert alert-warning"> No events found for <em class="text-danger">{{ query }}</em>, sorry! </p> <!-- Events listing --> <section class="list-group"> <a *ngFor="let event of fs.orderByDate(filteredEvents, 'startDatetime')" [routerLink]="['/event', event._id]" class="list-group-item list-group-item-action flex-column align-items-start"> <div class="d-flex w-100 justify-content-between"> <h5 class="mb-1" [innerHTML]="event.title"></h5> <small>{{ utils.eventDates(event.startDatetime, event.endDatetime) }}</small> </div> </a> </section> </ng-template> <!-- No upcoming public events available --> <p *ngIf="!eventList.length" class="alert alert-info"> No upcoming public events available. </p> </ng-template> <!-- Error loading events --> <p *ngIf="error" class="alert alert-danger"> <strong>Oops!</strong> There was an error retrieving event data. </p> </ng-template>

In the template, we'll use the structural directive NgIf to dynamically load only the parts of the UI that should be revealed at a particular state of the component. The <app-loading> component shows if the loading property is true , and the event list or error should show if loading is false (but not undefined ).

Note: Sometimes we're using a custom element template directive <ng-template [ngIf]> and sometimes we're using the *ngIf attribute directive. The <ng-template> approach does not create a container element in our markup, so we'll use this approach when we simply want if logic but no extra elements cluttering up our template. If we already have an element anyway, then we'll use the *ngIf attribute.

If event data was successfully retrieved and there are events present in the event array, we want to show a search form and the event list, which can be filtered on the fly. The search input is two-way bound to the query using the [(ngModel)] directive. This means that changes to the query will be kept in sync whether they came from the UI or the class. We then have a button that can be used to resetQuery() .

If the user searches for a term that produces no results in the filtered array, we'll show a warning. We can check for search results by passing the filteredEvents and query to our filter/sort service's noSearchResults() method.

We'll use our sortByDate() method from the filter/sort service to display events ordered by their startDatetime . We'll iterate over the filteredEvents array with the NgFor directive to display the event title, location, and dates. We'll also link to each event's detail page using the RouterLink directive and the event's _id . (We'll create this detail page a little later.)

If event data was retrieved but no events were returned in the array from the API, we'll show a message saying that there are no upcoming, public events available.

Last, if there was an error retrieving data from the API, we'll show a message. The console should also log the error message.

Our public events homepage should look something like this now:

If we type in a search query that returns no matches, we'll see the following:

If there are no events available in the database, the homepage should show this message:

When an error occurs fetching events data, the homepage should look like this:

Note: We can easily test API errors by stopping the Node API server in the terminal and reloading the Angular application in the browser. Without the API accessible, it will show an error.

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Summary

In Part 3 of our Real-World Angular Series, we've covered fetching data from the database with a Node API and manipulating and displaying the data in Angular. In the next part of the tutorial series, we'll tackle access management, displaying the admin events list, and developing an event details page with tabbed child components.