Import statement breaks typeorm enitities when registered through config.json file

Question

Following official docs, I created small koa/typeorm/postgres app. When I was using createConnection with config, importing entities in the same file, app was working fine, but typeorm cli coudn't find config file so I tried moving config to "ormconfig.json". Now I get this error:

SyntaxError: Cannot use import statement outside a module

It looks as if typeorm isn't able to use es6 features.

My ormconfig.json:

{
  "type": "postgres",
  "host": "localhost",
  "port": 5432,
  "username": ****,
  "password": ****,
  "database": ****,
  "synchronize": true,
  "entities": ["src/entity/**/*.ts"],
  "migrations": ["src/migration/**/*.ts"],
  "subscribers": ["src/subscriber/**/*.ts"],
  "cli": {
    "entitiesDir": "src/entity",
    "migrationsDir": "src/migration",
    "subscribersDir": "src/subscriber"
  }
}

My tsconfig.json:

{
  "compilerOptions": {
    "lib": ["es5", "es6"],
    "target": "es6",
    "module": "commonjs",
    "moduleResolution": "node",
    "outDir": "./dist",
    "emitDecoratorMetadata": true,
    "experimentalDecorators": true,
  },
  "exclude": ["node_modules"]
}

File with error:

import {
  BaseEntity,
  Column,
  Entity,
  PrimaryGeneratedColumn,
  CreateDateColumn,
  ManyToOne
} from 'typeorm';
import { IsIn, IsPositive, IsNotEmpty } from 'class-validator';

import { LOAN_TYPE } from '../consts';
import { User } from './user';

@Entity('loans')
export class Loan extends BaseEntity {
  @PrimaryGeneratedColumn()
  public id: number;

  @CreateDateColumn({ type: 'timestamp' })
  public createdAt: Date;

  @Column()
  @IsNotEmpty()
  @IsPositive()
  public amount: number;

  @Column({ type: 'enum', enum: LOAN_TYPE })
  @IsNotEmpty()
  @IsIn(Object.values(LOAN_TYPE))
  public type: LOAN_TYPE;

  @Column({ default: false })
  public approvalStatus: boolean;

  @ManyToOne(type => User, user => user.loans)
  @IsNotEmpty()
  public user: User;
}

export default Loan;

Solution 1

Are you getting the error when trying to run the CLI, or when running the app?

You may need to change the "entities" entry in ormconfig.json to ["dist/entity/**/*.js"] or the "entitiesDir" to "dist/entity".

Solution 2

1. Make sure you have "module": "commonjs" in "compilerOptions" of tsconfig.json
2. Run typeorm cli using ts-node: ts-node ./node_modules/typeorm/cli.js

See docs

Solution 3

Problem is caused not just loading entities, but also for migrations and subscribers.

Your app are looking for entities, migrations and subscribers files on pre-compiled .ts files. So the files contains "imports" not understood by nodejs, it is the cause of your error.

When typescript compile the code it converts all the imports to requires (understood by node).

So to stop error at all you should make your configurations on your ormconfig.json:

{
  "type": "postgres",
  "host": "localhost",
  "port": 5432,
  "username": ****,
  "password": ****,
  "database": ****,
  "synchronize": true,
  "entities": ["dist/entity/**/*.js"],
  "migrations": ["dist/migration/**/*.js"],
  "subscribers": ["dist/subscriber/**/*.js"],
  "cli": {
    "entitiesDir": "src/entity",
    "migrationsDir": "src/migration",
    "subscribersDir": "src/subscriber"
  }
}

Comments

[vvAve]

That was it, I figured it out later that night. It was confusing because I was following docs very closely.

[aizkhaj]

@robfz: I was just facing the same issue, and know that the proposed solution works, but with my synchronize: true setting, it won't show an updated table for my entity, so I'm trying to point it to src since there must be issues with it on build that's showing up in the dist entity. The question: is there a reason why it doesn't work with src path even though docs show it that way?

[Joseph Buchma]

Why down vote? Accepted answer is misleading, there is no need to point configuration to dist directory. If your entities are in typescript you should use ts-node to run CLI, as stated in the docs.

[Ajay]

I second it. The accepted answer is misleading. this is the correct answer! Thanks, @joseph for the correct answer! You saved my time!

[Vincent]

Totally agree too, during e2e test, it doesn't work, I had to use https://docs.nestjs.com/techniques/database#auto-load-entiti‌​es to autoload entities. Because during test, it's using ts-node transpiling code on the fly (in memory) and the dist directory is not present. So at the end. best option to work in any situation

[tim]

a related github issue github.com/typeorm/typeorm/issues/3079#issuecomment-44971461‌​4

[Patrick]

having to use the transpiled code in development is an abomination.

[nburk]

Side-note: If you don't have ts-node installed globally you can invoke it prefixed with npx, e.g.: npx ts-node ./node_modules/typeorm/cli.js migration:generate -n Init

[nburk]

The other answer of invoking the CLI via ts-node seems a bit nicer: npx ts-node ./node_modules/typeorm/cli.js migration:generate -n Init