axios abort request

abort.js

/**
 * The problem with using Promises for a request API is that Promises
 * make it difficult to abort the request. Typically when using XHR
 * some factory will wrap the actual XHR, but ultimately will return
 * the XHR object.
 * 
 * ```
 *  var request = performRequest('/user/12345');
 *  request.abort();
 * ```
 * 
 * Using Promises, the Promise is what's returned.
 * 
 * ```
 * var promise = performRequest('/user/12345');
 * promise.then((response) => { console.log(response); });
 * ```
 * 
 * How then can the request be aborted?
 * 
 * Working on axios (https://github.com/mzabriskie/axios),
 * I get a lot of requests (no pun intended) for how to
 * handle aborting a request once it's been made. This is
 * a potential workaround for aborting a request when using
 * XHR with Promises.
 */

// Setup request config and initiate the request
var config = {
  method: 'get',
  url: '/user/12345'
};
axios(config);

// Internally axios will add a requestID property to the
// request config. This is an auto incrementing integer
// that is unique to the request.
console.log(config); // {method: 'get', url: '/user/12345', requestID: 0}

// Now the request can be aborted by passing the requestID
// to axios.abort. Behind the scenes axios will have a
// collection of requests indexed by requestID. The request
// can then be aborted if it hasn't already been fulfilled.
// This is very similar to how setTimeout/clearTimeout works.
axios.abort(config.requestID);

I agree with @pluma about adding the method to the returned promise. How about this API:

var request = axios({
  url: '/some/url',
});
request.then(function (res) {
  console.log('Request was successful');
}).catch(function (res) {
  console.log('An error occurred');
});

request.abort();

So, the API is one thing, and error handling is another.

any news on this? I believe it should reject the promise with an Abort state. How would it work with es7 async await, e.g:

const { data } = await axios({
  url: '/some/url',
});

In case the promise doesn't get rejected the code about would stuck forever.

Agreed with @esnunes. Aborting it is an error in the fulfillment of the promise's goal (which was to "return" the response data). Just because it's developer-initiated it doesn't mean it's not an error in the request flow.

Agreed with @herrstucki's comment. cancelPreviousRequest would be pretty useful!

This doesn't seem to work on 0.15.3. Is there a way to do it now? I see there are cancellation tokens but I want to be able to prevent duplicate requests to the same URL from executing if one is still pending.

@mzabriskie Any updates on this, interested to. abort() isn't an option in the latest, cancelPreviousRequest would be useful. I know the latest supports cancelTokens now but they don't work for me.