Read a file one line at a time in node.js?

Question

I am trying to read a large file one line at a time. I found a question on Quora that dealt with the subject but I\'m missing some connections to make the whole thing fit to

Answer 1

For such a simple operation there shouldn't be any dependency on third-party modules. Go easy.

var fs = require('fs'),
    readline = require('readline');

var rd = readline.createInterface({
    input: fs.createReadStream('/path/to/file'),
    output: process.stdout,
    console: false
});

rd.on('line', function(line) {
    console.log(line);
});

Answer 2

Update in 2019

An awesome example is already posted on official Nodejs documentation. here

This requires the latest Nodejs is installed on your machine. >11.4

const fs = require('fs');
const readline = require('readline');

async function processLineByLine() {
  const fileStream = fs.createReadStream('input.txt');

  const rl = readline.createInterface({
    input: fileStream,
    crlfDelay: Infinity
  });
  // Note: we use the crlfDelay option to recognize all instances of CR LF
  // ('\r\n') in input.txt as a single line break.

  for await (const line of rl) {
    // Each line in input.txt will be successively available here as `line`.
    console.log(`Line from file: ${line}`);
  }
}

processLineByLine();

Answer 3

Another solution is to run logic via sequential executor nsynjs. It reads file line-by-line using node readline module, and it doesn't use promises or recursion, therefore not going to fail on large files. Here is how the code will looks like:

var nsynjs = require('nsynjs');
var textFile = require('./wrappers/nodeReadline').textFile; // this file is part of nsynjs

function process(textFile) {

    var fh = new textFile();
    fh.open('path/to/file');
    var s;
    while (typeof(s = fh.readLine(nsynjsCtx).data) != 'undefined')
        console.log(s);
    fh.close();
}

var ctx = nsynjs.run(process,{},textFile,function () {
    console.log('done');
});

Code above is based on this exampe: https://github.com/amaksr/nsynjs/blob/master/examples/node-readline/index.js

Answer 4

Generator based line reader: https://github.com/neurosnap/gen-readlines

var fs = require('fs');
var readlines = require('gen-readlines');

fs.open('./file.txt', 'r', function(err, fd) {
  if (err) throw err;
  fs.fstat(fd, function(err, stats) {
    if (err) throw err;

    for (var line of readlines(fd, stats.size)) {
      console.log(line.toString());
    }

  });
});

Answer 5

I wrap the whole logic of daily line processing as a npm module: line-kit https://www.npmjs.com/package/line-kit

// example
var count = 0
require('line-kit')(require('fs').createReadStream('/etc/issue'),
                    (line) => { count++; },
                    () => {console.log(`seen ${count} lines`)})

Answer 6

Since posting my original answer, I found that split is a very easy to use node module for line reading in a file; Which also accepts optional parameters.

var split = require('split');
fs.createReadStream(file)
    .pipe(split())
    .on('data', function (line) {
      //each chunk now is a seperate line! 
    });

Haven't tested on very large files. Let us know if you do.