How to get values from custom configuration file in Nestjs with interface?

Question

I'm trying to set up all of my configurations in one file in "config.ts", load it to ConfigService and then with config interfaces get values from it. So here is my config.ts that have ENV vars from my .env file and static variables.

UPD: Made repo with this example

import { Config } from './config.interface';

const config: Config = {
  typeorm: {
    type: 'postgres',
    host: process.env.DB_HOST,
    port: +process.env.DB_PORT,
    username: process.env.DB_USERNAME,
    password: process.env.DB_PASSWORD,
    database: process.env.DB_NAME,
    synchronize: process.env.NODE_ENV !== 'prod',
    logging: true,
    entities: [User, RefreshToken],
  },
};

export default () => config;

And here is my interfaces:

export interface Config {
  typeorm: TypeOrmConfig;
}

export interface TypeOrmConfig {
  type: string;
  host: string;
  port: number;
  username: string;
  password: string;
  database: string;
  synchronize: boolean;
  logging: boolean;
  entities: any[];
}

The config is loaded to ConfigModule in app.module.ts

@Module({
  imports: [
    ConfigModule.forRoot({
      isGlobal: true,
      envFilePath: '.dev.env',
      load: [config],
    }),
}),

For example I want to set up my TypeOrmModule with this setting. Based on NestJs documentation

TypeOrmModule.forRootAsync({
      imports: [ConfigModule],
      useFactory: async (configService: ConfigService) => {
        const config = configService.get<TypeOrmConfig>('typeorm');
        console.log(config);
        return {
          type: config.type,
          host: config.host,
          port: +config.port,
          username: config.username,
          password: config.password,
          database: config.database,
          synchronize: config.synchronize,
          logging: config.logging,
          entities: config.entities,
        };
      },
      inject: [ConfigService],
    }),

Here is the problem. Static values from config is okay, but all my ENV vars is undefined. Here is console.log output:

{
  type: 'postgres',
  host: undefined,
  port: NaN,
  username: undefined,
  password: undefined,
  database: undefined,
  synchronize: true,
  logging: true,
  entities: [
    [class User extends CoreEntity],
    [class RefreshToken extends CoreEntity]
  ]
}

I don't understand what's the problem with undefined ENV vars I would be grateful for any explanations and help

Answer 1

In short, NestJS requires you to define a namespace for your custom configuration "typeorm" which you are trying to access here (see Configuration Namespace):

const config = configService.get<TypeOrmConfig>('typeorm');

This means that you must use registerAs function to create your namespace:

import { registerAs } from '@nestjs/config';
import { TypeOrmConfig } from './config.interface';

export default registerAs(
  'typeorm',
  (): TypeOrmConfig => ({
    type: 'postgres',
    host: process.env.DB_HOST,
    port: +process.env.DB_PORT,
    username: process.env.DB_USERNAME,
    password: process.env.DB_PASSWORD,
    database: process.env.DB_NAME,
    synchronize: process.env.NODE_ENV !== 'prod',
    logging: true,
    entities: [],
  }),
);

This will do the trick. However, we can improve upon this.

Instead of defining your own interface for the TypeORM configuration, there are existing interfaces you can use and / or extend from to reduce boilerplate code (below I mention ConnectionOptions though TypeOrmModuleOptions might be more appropriate depending on your configuration needs). I would also suggest providing fallback values to environmental variables:

import { registerAs } from '@nestjs/config';
import { ConnectionOptions } from 'typeorm';

const CONNECTION_TYPE = 'postgres';

export default registerAs(
  'typeorm',
  (): ConnectionOptions => ({
    type: CONNECTION_TYPE,
    host: process.env.DB_HOST || 'default_value',
    port: +process.env.DB_PORT || 3000,
    username: process.env.DB_USERNAME || 'default_value',
    password: process.env.DB_PASSWORD || 'default_value',
    database: process.env.DB_NAME || 'default_value',
    synchronize: process.env.NODE_ENV !== 'prod',
    logging: true,
    entities: [],
  }),
);  

Also, there is no need to explicitly assign configuration values to TypeOrmModule again as you can simply:

TypeOrmModule.forRootAsync({
  imports: [ConfigModule],
  useFactory: async (configService: ConfigService) =>
    await configService.get('typeorm'),
  inject: [ConfigService],
}),

As a personal flavour I like to create configuration enum to contain configuration names to prevent misspelling. Consider this:

export enum ConfigEnum {
  TYPEORM = 'typeorm',
}

TypeOrmModule.forRootAsync({
  imports: [ConfigModule],
  useFactory: async (configService: ConfigService) =>
    await configService.get<Promise<TypeOrmModuleOptions>>(
      ConfigEnum.TYPEORM,
    ),
  inject: [ConfigService],
})

Async / Await pattern is also redundant here, as we do not actually perform anything async, so this will work as well:

TypeOrmModule.forRootAsync({
  imports: [ConfigModule],
  useFactory: (configService: ConfigService) =>
    configService.get<TypeOrmModuleOptions>(ConfigEnum.TYPEORM),
  inject: [ConfigService],
})

Ps. I have made a pull request, see https://github.com/JustDenP/nest-config/pull/1