How to accept optional fields with empty or NULL value in adonis v5

[zmaglica]

Hi. Let's have a case where the end-user wants to update his profile and he wants to remove his phone number (for example). Since it is an update form, all fields are optional. The problem is when I send a null, validation ignores it and request.validate function doesn't return the "phone" field that is null in this case.

When I try it using Insomnia (or postman) with phone parameter equals NULL, validator gets it as a string and saves it as a string

Does anyone know how to achieve it?

[fnoquiq]

You need to add that phone is optional.

public schema = schema.create({
  field1: schema.string(),
  field2: schema.string.opcional(),
})

{
  "field1": "something",
  "field2": null // Undefined
}

// or

{
  "field1": "something"
} // No need to send the optional field in the body of the request

const { field1, field2 } = await request.validate(validator)

// In both cases above, this value will be undefined
console.log(field2) // Undefined

[fnoquiq]

Or

if ( !phone ) {
  phone = null
}

[zmaglica]

@fnoquiq I am planning to do something similar. If "phone" parameter exists in the request object and it is empty, null I will cast it to null.

[thetutlage]

The data type of phone is a string and null is not a string. So whether you omit the field all together or you send an empty string. There is no 3rd option

[fnoquiq]

Maybe something like this works too.

user.merge({ phone: phone ?? null })
await user.save()

Note: [not tested]

[zmaglica]

@fnoquiq it will work in case that front-end always sends phone parameter. In cases where phone parameter is missing (when you don't want to change your phone), your example will change phone value to null.

Thank you for example.