How can I add a custom value to my Node.js HTTP request for Express to consume

Question

I have an Express server listening on a Unix Domain Socket. I'm making an http request like so:

 const requestOptions = {socketPath, method, path, headers, _custom: {foo: () => 'bar'}} http.request(requestOptions, responseCb)

And want to use _custom in my Express route handlers

 app.get('/', (req, res) => { console.log(req._custom) })

Is this possible?

EDIT: _custom is an object with functions.

EDIT: The answer I marked as correct is the best solution I could find, however it does not allow sending of objects (which is what I really want).

Answer 1

You can add _custom to your req object by adding custom middleware in your Express server prior to your routes that need to use req._custom .

 app.use((req, res, next) => { if (req.get('X-Custom-Header')) { // add custom to your request object req._custom = req.get('X-Custom-Header'); } return next(); });

On the client side you can add the custom header

 let headers = { 'X-Custom-Header': 'my-custom-value' }; const requestOptions = {socketPath, method, path, headers}; http.request(requestOptions, responseCb)