firebase realtime database calling set with new properties - firebase

Question

i am using firebase realtime DB with my ionic app and using angularfire2. I have data stored like:
"users" : {
"230A3lKQqWh0TczOGP8sbtMVpuF2" : {
"email" : "xxx#gmail.com",
"isAdmin" : false,
"name" : "Santosh Yadav",
"pic" : "https://graph.facebook.com/xxx/picture"
},
"oSEYj0zrkhPCk9r7uwyOOkHcqe53" : {
"email" : "yyy#gmail.com",
"isAdmin" : true,
"name" : "Vik Kumar",
"pic" : "https://graph.facebook.com/xxx/picture"
},
"tl3uvseaBeWVYFCTwSngUqcSokX2" : {
"email" : "zzz#gmail.com",
"isAdmin" : false,
"name" : "Neeti Singhal",
"pic" : "https://graph.facebook.com/xxx/picture"
}
}
We ended up to store more user data like date of birth and date of aniversary and when we try to update it as below:
createUser(user:User){
console.log('start of create user')
var payload = {
"name": user.name,
"email": user.email,
"pic" : user.pic,
"dob" : user.dob,
"anivDate" : user.anivDate,
}
return this.db.object('/users/' + user.uid).set(payload).then(
(resp) => console.log("user created")
).catch(
(err) => console.log("issues creating user:" + err)
)
}
It fails with error:
ERROR Error: Reference.set failed: First argument contains undefined in property 'users.oSEYj0zrkhPCk9r7uwyOOkHcqe53.anivDate'
at validateFirebaseData (validation.js:113)
at validation.js:140
at forEach (obj.js:46)
I understand the error that it is unable to set a property anivDate that does not exist in my firebase realtime DB. This will fix if i manually add the property into the db manually. But that is not a practical fix. So, what is the solution here?
To define the fix: i am expecting to add a new property if that does not exist else just update it.

Answer 1

For a quick fix, use the || operator to set a default value on undefined elements. Usage:
var payload = {
"anivDate": user.anivDate || "1970-01-01",
...
};
This sets anivDate to user.anivDate if it exists, 1970-01-01 if it does not. (This works, but in my opinion it is better practice to not have a anivDate property on a user if no such value exists, and check for that value's existence when accessing the data.)
For a more scalable/reliable fix, use Firebase's realtime database triggers to add async validating or default values to your new columns.