Express Middleware not being called for some endpoints

[AbanobNageh]

Is there an existing issue for this?

• I have searched the existing issues

Current behavior

This issue happens when there are 2 endpoints:

• The first endpoint has no params, ex: /all
• The second endpoint has a param, ex: /:id

If the /:id endpoint is excluded from the middleware then the middleware is not called for both of the 2 endpoints.

Minimum reproduction code

https://github.com/AbanobNageh/nestjs-middleware-exclude-issue

Steps to reproduce

The above repository has a middleware and the following endpoints:

• the first is /all. The middleware should run for this endpoint.
• The second is /:id. The middleware should not run for this endpoint.

You can reproduce the issue by using the tests in the repository.

1. Run the tests from the above repository.
2. Notice how the /all endpoint test fails and the /:id endpoint test succeeds when only the /:id endpoint is excluded.

Expected behavior

Only the excluded endpoints should be excluded from the middleware. The middleware should run for the /all endpoint and shouldn't run for the /:id endpoint.

Package

• I don't know. Or some 3rd-party package
• @nestjs/common
• @nestjs/core
• @nestjs/microservices
• @nestjs/platform-express
• @nestjs/platform-fastify
• @nestjs/platform-socket.io
• @nestjs/platform-ws
• @nestjs/testing
• @nestjs/websockets
• Other (see below)

Other package

No response

NestJS version

10.3.8

Packages versions

{
  "name": "nestjs-middleware-exclude-issue",
  "version": "0.0.1",
  "description": "",
  "author": "",
  "private": true,
  "license": "UNLICENSED",
  "scripts": {
    "build": "nest build",
    "format": "prettier --write \"src/**/*.ts\" \"test/**/*.ts\"",
    "start": "nest start",
    "start:dev": "nest start --watch",
    "start:debug": "nest start --debug --watch",
    "start:prod": "node dist/main",
    "lint": "eslint \"{src,apps,libs,test}/**/*.ts\" --fix",
    "test": "jest",
    "test:watch": "jest --watch",
    "test:cov": "jest --coverage",
    "test:debug": "node --inspect-brk -r tsconfig-paths/register -r ts-node/register node_modules/.bin/jest --runInBand",
    "test:e2e": "jest --config ./test/jest-e2e.json"
  },
  "dependencies": {
    "@nestjs/common": "^10.3.8",
    "@nestjs/core": "^10.3.8",
    "@nestjs/platform-express": "^10.3.8",
    "reflect-metadata": "^0.2.2",
    "rxjs": "^7.8.1"
  },
  "devDependencies": {
    "@nestjs/cli": "^10.3.2",
    "@nestjs/schematics": "^10.1.1",
    "@nestjs/testing": "^10.3.8",
    "@types/express": "^4.17.21",
    "@types/jest": "^29.5.12",
    "@types/node": "^20.12.12",
    "@types/supertest": "^6.0.2",
    "@typescript-eslint/eslint-plugin": "~7.9.0",
    "@typescript-eslint/parser": "~7.9.0",
    "eslint": "^8.56.0",
    "eslint-config-prettier": "^9.1.0",
    "eslint-plugin-prettier": "^5.1.3",
    "jest": "^29.7.0",
    "prettier": "^3.2.5",
    "source-map-support": "^0.5.21",
    "supertest": "^7.0.0",
    "ts-jest": "^29.1.2",
    "ts-loader": "^9.5.1",
    "ts-node": "^10.9.2",
    "tsconfig-paths": "^4.2.0",
    "typescript": "^5.4.5"
  },
  "jest": {
    "moduleFileExtensions": [
      "js",
      "json",
      "ts"
    ],
    "rootDir": "src",
    "testRegex": ".*\\.spec\\.ts$",
    "transform": {
      "^.+\\.(t|j)s$": "ts-jest"
    },
    "collectCoverageFrom": [
      "**/*.(t|j)s"
    ],
    "coverageDirectory": "../coverage",
    "testEnvironment": "node"
  }
}

Node.js version

20.10.0

In which operating systems have you tested?

• macOS
• Windows
• Linux

Other

No response

[satanshiro]

there is another configuration where it does not work:
this will ignore previous exclude calls

consumer.apply(someMiddleware)
.exclude('id')
.exclude('somethingelse')

this works

consumer.apply(someMiddleware)
.exclude('id', 'somethingelse')

[micalevisk]

@satanshiro I guess that's another issue. Would you like to create a PR to fix that one?

[EeeasyCode]

@AbanobNageh @micalevisk
this works!
I have confirmed that I can use such regular expressions to exclude specific pattern paths from the middleware.

consumer
      .apply(AppMiddleware)
      .exclude({ path: '/:id(\\d+)', method: RequestMethod.GET })
      .forRoutes(AppController);

[EeeasyCode]

and @satanshiro this code works, too!

consumer
      .apply(AppMiddleware)
      .exclude({ path: 'all', method: RequestMethod.GET })
      .exclude({ path: '/:id(\\d+)', method: RequestMethod.GET })
      .forRoutes(AppController);

[EeeasyCode]

@micalevisk
Hello, I am a university student from South Korea developing with NestJS.
I would like to contribute to NestJS, but I am not sure where to start. Could you help me?
Someday, I hope to make a significant contribution to the NestJS framework!
Thanks for reading!

[micalevisk]

@EeeasyCode

1. read the https://github.com/nestjs/nest/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md
2. pick any open Issue and try to solve it
   Use our discord server http://discord.gg/nestjs to discuss it further if needed.

[AbanobNageh]

@EeeasyCode Thank you. However, How did you test this? The code you included doesn't work for me. I tried it on my reproduction repo above and the tests still fail.

Also, my knowledge of Regex is lacking so excuse me if I am wrong but are you saying that for every path with a param (ex: /:id) we would need to explicitly add the paths that should not match (ex: /all)? If this is the case then this could be an ok temporary solution for small codebases but it doesn't seem like a feasible solution for large codebases where there could be many such endpoints.

[EeeasyCode]

@AbanobNageh

I think I found the cause of the issue. When /:id is entered, it receives the id in the format of /1 or /test, and in such cases, it cannot distinguish between @Get('/1') and @Get('/test'). To handle this, you should either use the regular expression I initially suggested or specify the path with a prefix in the Controller.