how can I send an 'ogg' file in the body of my HTTP POST request?

Question

I am working on a nodejs project which needs to get a response by making a POST request to the API in which I need to send an audio file (audio.ogg) in the body of request. In 'postman' we can do something like this by selecting the file from local and make request.

How can I do the same with my Nodejs application using an npm package like 'request'?

My code so far is quoted here:

var request = require('request');
var fs = require('fs');
var path = require('path');

router.get('/', function(req, res, next) {
  var options = {
    method: 'post',
    body: {
      'language': "<language>",
      'audio_file':path.join(__dirname, 'audio.ogg')

    }, // Javascript object
    json: true,
    url: "<API>",
    headers: {
      'Authorization': "<token>",
      'ContentType': "application/x-www-form-urlencoded"
    }
  }

  request(options, function (err, res, body) {
    if (err) {
      console.log('Error :', err)
      return
    }
    console.log(' Body :', body)

  });
  // res.render('index', { title: 'Express' });
});

Answer 1

In options.headers, since you're sending binary data, your ContentType should be "multipart/form-data" instead of "application/x-www-form-urlencoded" as binary data is noted to be inefficient to transfer using x-www-form-urlencoded (see this SO answer for details on why).

Luckily, the request library you are already using includes the form-data library for handling multipart/form-data requests. request provides the formData option for this, which you would use instead of using the body option.

Your updated options object might look something like this:

var formData = {
  // Pass a simple key-value pair
  language: '<language>',
  // Pass data via Streams
  my_file: fs.createReadStream(__dirname + '/audio.ogg')
};

var options = {
    method: 'post',
    formData: formData,
    url: "<API>",
    headers: {
      'Authorization': "<token>",
      'ContentType': "multipart/form-data"
    }
}

For more info, check the documentation for request here