node

Viam SDK Quickstart - Node.js

This example demonstrates how to connect to a machine using Node.js.

Usage

You must have a .env file in this directory with the following connection info which can be easily found in the TypeScript code sample for your machine. Use the authEntity value from the Code Sample as the API_KEY_ID and the payload value as the API_KEY.

HOST="<HOST>"
API_KEY_ID="<API_KEY_ID>"
API_KEY="<API_KEY>"

Installing will build the TypeScript SDK, then you can run the example using Vite.

cd examples/node
npm install
npm start

Edit src/main.ts to change the machine logic being run.

Configuration

Using Viam's TypeScript SDK with Node.js requires some configurations. They are outlined below. Copying this project as a template is a good approach given the dependencies and polyfills requried. In the future, we hope to minimize the work neeed to get started here.

Dependencies

The following direct dependencies are required:

• @connectrpc/connect-node
• node-datachannel

In addition, polyfills and a node specific gRPC Transport are provided in main.ts.

main.ts

The main.ts file was updated to include the following polyfills and updates:

• WebRTC Polyfills:

  const wrtc = require('node-datachannel/polyfill');
  for (const key in wrtc) {
    (global as any)[key] = (wrtc as any)[key];
  }

• GRPC connection configuration

  const VIAM = require('@viamrobotics/sdk');
  globalThis.VIAM = {
    // @ts-ignore
    GRPC_TRANSPORT_FACTORY: (opts: any) =>
      connectNode.createGrpcTransport({ httpVersion: '2', ...opts }),
  };