Can I use firestore triggers without first deploying my functions? I am getting an error that looks like it but I want to be sure.
If you want a Firestore trigger to respond to a change in a document that's actually in Firestore (and not running in a local emulator), then yes, you will have to deploy the trigger. Cloud Functions only works when deployed to Google's cloud.
Related
I recently set up the firebase emulators to run my cloud functions locally. After setup, the cloud functions triggered successfully but any write to the real-time database does not reflect in the corresponding local database emulator UI. e.g when I use
snapshot.after.ref.parent.child('busy').set(true)
So I tried exporting and importing the real-time data and I discovered that all database write from cloud functions was being saved in a default database with name localhost:4000/?ns=pick2-c468b-default-rtdb and not the database that is triggering the write event.
Is this the default behaviour of the emulator and how do I go about changing or fixing it?
Writes to snapshot.after.ref should go to the database that triggered the Function.
If that is not happening for you, I recommend reporting a bug with a minimal repro on the repo (which should include an entire Cloud Function, and not just the line that you think is going wrong.
I am having trouble running the firebase functions emulator towards a production database. I have a project which is not publicly released yet so I can run towards production with any negative effects.
My project uses only the realtime database, it does not use Firestore (so other questions on SO are not relevant) The documentation states "Cloud Firestore and Realtime Database triggers already have sufficient credentials, and do not require additional setup." so according to that, I shouldn't need any additional setup in order to point to the production database.
According to all of the documentation on Firebase, the project should run towards the real firebase database if I only start the functions emulator and do not start the database emulator. This warning seems to say so, too:
functions: The following emulators are not running, calls to these services from the Functions emulator will affect production: auth, firestore, database, hosting, pubsub
However, this is not what happens. Instead, I get the following error:
functions[onGlobalClientRequest]: function ignored because the database emulator does not exist or is not running.
I have read the firebase documentation and nothing is really mentioned other than setting credentials should not be needed (but I am setting credentials anyway using export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="/path/to/credentials.json" before running the functions emulator.)
onGlobalClientRequest looks like this:
export const onGlobalClientRequest = functions.database
.ref( client_requests_key + "/{pushedid}")
.onCreate(
async (
snap: functions.database.DataSnapshot,
context: functions.EventContext,
) => {
///.... code here...
},
);
The locally emulated Firebase Functions will be able to write to the Prod database, but will not be able to get triggered by the production database.
Here is a SO answer from a Google employee that states the aforementioned.
Also, quoting from this other SO answer from another Google employee:
In general the rule with emulators:start is that we comprehensively emulate whatever is running. So for example if you're running the Functions and Database emulator, all writes from functions (through admin.database().... will be redirected to the Database emulator. But writes to Firestore (admin.firestore()...) will try and hit production because that emulator is not running.
Operations on a Realtime Database (RTDB) trigger the functions in the corresponding project. So the production RTDB triggers functions of your production project, and the emulated RTDB triggers emulated functions.
If you want to test functions triggered by RTDB operations locally with the emulator, you have to use the RTDB emulator as well. This is explained in the doc here.
If you only want to test HTTP callable functions, then you can use a remote RTDB.
I have a firebase functions project that connects to a firebase database in the cloud. If I write a database trigger in my firebase functions, and I emulate those functions locally, will the trigger fire? I mean, because the database is running on the cloud, does it even know about my locally running trigger?
No, the local emulator doesn't work that way. The only way you can trigger a database function with the emulator is through the command prompt you're provided with.
I am new on firebase cloud functions. I would like to ask a question about always running or self-triggering functions. How can we handle these things? How can we implement always running functions or self-triggering?
Google Cloud Functions are snippets of code that run in response to events that happen somewhere else. Some example events:
a HTTPS URL is accessed, either from application code, or in some other way
a User account is created on Firebase Authentication
a node is written in the Firebase Realtime Database
a message is sent to a Cloud PubSub topic
There is no concept on a forever-running function on Cloud Functions (nor on other, similar Functions-as-a-Service offerings), although it's definitely possible to create a function that gets triggered every minute or so (like a cron job).
As I know currently Cloud Functions doesn't support triggering functions from Firebase.
For now I'm planing to use an basic Engine instance to trigger the functions based on the queue.
Is this the right way to go? or should I trigger the cloud function directly from the clients device after the data is inserted in the db?
thank you
Cloud Functions for Firebase was just launched today! You can use the SDK to trigger cloud functions from your Firebase database, storage bucket, authentication, and analytics events. https://firebase.google.com/docs/functions/