Manually setting timestamp values in bookshelf.js

Question

I have a table set up to have timestamps and bookshelf configured to use them. Normally everything happens as it should and bookshelf takes care of the timestamps, but I have a case where I want to specify them, but when I try to do that the values are ignored and the current date is used.

I've tried to simplify my use case down to the essentials:

var Author = Bookshelf.Model.extend({
  tableName: 'authors',
  hasTimestamps: ['created_at', 'updated_at'],

  bookAuthors: function(){
    return this.hasMany(require('.book_authors'));
  },

  associateBookWithAuthor(bookId,timestamp) {
    return self.related('bookAuthors').create({
      book_id: bookId,
      updated_at: timestamp, // ignored by bookshelf
      created_at: timestamp  // also ignored
    })
  }
}

I still want to keep the hasTimestamps configured for regular use cases. Is it possible to get Bookshelf to let me override the timestamps behavior?

Answer 1

After looking at the Bookshelf source created_at and updated_at are set on create/insert as necessary and never read from the model you pass in: https://github.com/tgriesser/bookshelf/blob/c83ada77d5c670a773c0b47c604b452cd0e03e86/src/base/model.js#L413

This makes my goal impossible. Reflecting on that it seems like a good idea to not overload these columns and to create another column for the date I'm trying to store.

Answer 2

Just updating right answer for new visitors to this question. The latest is bookshelf allows overriding timestamp values.

See official documentation and example here

https://bookshelfjs.org/api.html#Model-instance-hasTimestamps

myModel.save({created_at: new Date(2015, 5, 2)}).then(function(updatedModel) {
  // {
  //   name: 'blah',
  //   created_at: 'Tue Jun 02 2015 00:00:00 GMT+0100 (WEST)',
  //   updated_at: 'Sun Mar 25 2018 15:07:11 GMT+0100 (WEST)'
  // }
})