Add data to couchdb with jsonp response

Question

Is there a way add data to a couchdb that runs on another domain and get back an response whether the operation was successfully or not? I know couchdb supports jsonp callback but can I add data with this approach?

Answer 1

No, you cannot currently do this. CouchDB's REST API requires a POST or PUT request in order to insert data, but JSONP only supports GET requests. So you can retrieve data from CouchDB across domains, but updates/inserts/deletes won't work.

Answer 2

You can use client-side javascript to make a form to do the POST, direct the output to an iframe, and use cross-window iframe messaging to get the result.

Of course, someone has already made a nice javascript library to do this. Get the code here: https://github.com/benvinegar/couchdb-xd

Follow the instructions to push it as an additional database on your couchdb server. Then, on any site, include one not in the 'your-couch-server' domain, you can do the following (just try it in the javascript console):

jQuery.getScript(
    "http://YOUR-COUCH-SERVER/couchdb-xd/_design/couchdb-xd/couchdb.js", 
    function() {
        Couch.init(
            function() { 
                var s = new Couch.Server('http://YOUR-COUCH-SERVER/'); 
                var d = new Couch.Database(s,'YOURDB'); 
                d.put(
                    "stackoverflow-test 1", 
                    { foo: 111, bar: 222 },
                    function(resp) {
                        console.log(resp);          
                    } 
                );
            }
        )
    }
);

The above presumes you have jquery is already loaded on the page. If not, you'll need to add it however you're currently interacting with the other page.

The library only works on modern browsers with window.postMessage() support, though a small patch may eventually allow older browsers to use it via src/hash communication.