Workers Patterns

Workers Patterns

Error Handling

class HTTPError extends Error {
  constructor(public status: number, message: string) { super(message); }
}

export default {
  async fetch(request: Request, env: Env): Promise<Response> {
    try {
      return await handleRequest(request, env);
    } catch (error) {
      if (error instanceof HTTPError) {
        return new Response(JSON.stringify({ error: error.message }), {
          status: error.status, headers: { 'Content-Type': 'application/json' }
        });
      }
      return new Response('Internal Server Error', { status: 500 });
    }
  },
};

CORS

const corsHeaders = { 'Access-Control-Allow-Origin': '*', 'Access-Control-Allow-Methods': 'GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, OPTIONS' };
if (request.method === 'OPTIONS') return new Response(null, { headers: corsHeaders });

Routing

const router = { 'GET /api/users': handleGetUsers, 'POST /api/users': handleCreateUser };

const handler = router[`${request.method} ${url.pathname}`];
return handler ? handler(request, env) : new Response('Not Found', { status: 404 });

Production: Use Hono, itty-router, or Worktop (see frameworks.md)

Request Validation (Zod)

import { z } from 'zod';

const userSchema = z.object({
  name: z.string().min(1).max(100),
  email: z.string().email(),
  age: z.number().int().positive().optional(),
});

async function handleCreateUser(request: Request) {
  try {
    const body = await request.json();
    const validated = userSchema.parse(body);  // Throws on invalid data
    return new Response(JSON.stringify({ id: 1, ...validated }), {
      status: 201,
      headers: { 'Content-Type': 'application/json' },
    });
  } catch (err) {
    if (err instanceof z.ZodError) {
      return new Response(JSON.stringify({ errors: err.errors }), { status: 400 });
    }
    throw err;
  }
}

With Hono: Use @hono/zod-validator for automatic validation (see frameworks.md)

Performance

// ❌ Sequential
const user = await fetch('/api/user/1');
const posts = await fetch('/api/posts?user=1');

// ✅ Parallel
const [user, posts] = await Promise.all([fetch('/api/user/1'), fetch('/api/posts?user=1')]);

Streaming

const stream = new ReadableStream({
  async start(controller) {
    for (let i = 0; i < 1000; i++) {
      controller.enqueue(new TextEncoder().encode(`Item ${i}\n`));
      if (i % 100 === 0) await new Promise(r => setTimeout(r, 0));
    }
    controller.close();
  }
});

Transform Streams

response.body.pipeThrough(new TextDecoderStream()).pipeThrough(
  new TransformStream({ transform(chunk, c) { c.enqueue(chunk.toUpperCase()); } })
).pipeThrough(new TextEncoderStream());

Testing

import { describe, it, expect } from 'vitest';
import worker from '../src/index';

describe('Worker', () => {
  it('returns 200', async () => {
    const req = new Request('http://localhost/');
    const env = { MY_VAR: 'test' };
    const ctx = { waitUntil: () => {}, passThroughOnException: () => {} };
    expect((await worker.fetch(req, env, ctx)).status).toBe(200);
  });
});

Deployment

npx wrangler deploy              # production
npx wrangler deploy --env staging
npx wrangler versions upload --message "Add feature"
npx wrangler rollback

Monitoring

const start = Date.now();
const response = await handleRequest(request, env);
ctx.waitUntil(env.ANALYTICS.writeDataPoint({
  doubles: [Date.now() - start], blobs: [request.url, String(response.status)]
}));

Security & Rate Limiting

// Security headers
const security = { 'X-Content-Type-Options': 'nosniff', 'X-Frame-Options': 'DENY' };

// Auth
const auth = request.headers.get('Authorization');
if (!auth?.startsWith('Bearer ')) return new Response('Unauthorized', { status: 401 });

// Gradual rollouts (deterministic user bucketing)
const hash = await crypto.subtle.digest('SHA-256', new TextEncoder().encode(userId));
if (new Uint8Array(hash)[0] % 100 < rolloutPercent) return newFeature(request);

Rate limiting: See Durable Objects

R2 Multipart Upload

// For files > 100MB
const upload = await env.MY_BUCKET.createMultipartUpload('large-file.bin');
try {
  const parts = [];
  for (let i = 0; i < chunks.length; i++) {
    parts.push(await upload.uploadPart(i + 1, chunks[i]));
  }
  await upload.complete(parts);
} catch (err) { await upload.abort(); throw err; }

Parallel uploads, resume on failure, handle files > 5GB

Workflows (Step Orchestration)

import { WorkflowEntrypoint, WorkflowStep, WorkflowEvent } from 'cloudflare:workers';

export class MyWorkflow extends WorkflowEntrypoint {
  async run(event: WorkflowEvent<{ userId: string }>, step: WorkflowStep) {
    const user = await step.do('fetch-user', async () => 
      fetch(`/api/users/${event.payload.userId}`).then(r => r.json())
    );
    await step.sleep('wait', '1 hour');
    await step.do('notify', async () => sendEmail(user.email));
  }
}

Multi-step jobs with automatic retries, state persistence, resume from failure

See Also

• API - Runtime APIs
• Gotchas - Common issues
• Configuration - Setup
• Frameworks - Hono, routing, validation