Class: Snowflake

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:37

A class for generating and deconstructing Twitter snowflakes.

A Twitter snowflake is a 64-bit unsigned integer with 4 fields that have a fixed epoch value.

If we have a snowflake 266241948824764416 we can represent it as binary:

64                                          22     17     12          0
 000000111011000111100001101001000101000000  00001  00000  000000000000
          number of ms since epoch           worker  pid    increment

Constructors

Constructor

new Snowflake(epoch: number | bigint | Date): Snowflake

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:77

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
epoch	number | bigint | Date	the epoch to use

Returns

Snowflake

Properties

[EpochNumberSymbol]

private readonly [EpochNumberSymbol]: number

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:54

Internal

Internal reference of the epoch passed in the constructor as a number

---

[EpochSymbol]

private readonly [EpochSymbol]: bigint

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:48

Internal

Internal reference of the epoch passed in the constructor

---

[IncrementSymbol]

private [IncrementSymbol]: bigint = 0n

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:60

Internal

Internal incrementor for generating snowflakes

---

[ProcessIdSymbol]

private [ProcessIdSymbol]: bigint = 1n

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:66

Internal

The process ID that will be used by default in the generate method

---

[WorkerIdSymbol]

private [WorkerIdSymbol]: bigint = 0n

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:72

Internal

The worker ID that will be used by default in the generate method

---

decode()

decode: (id: string | bigint) => DeconstructedSnowflake

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:42

Alias for deconstruct

Deconstructs a snowflake given a snowflake ID

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
id	string | bigint	the snowflake to deconstruct

Returns

DeconstructedSnowflake

a deconstructed snowflake

Example

const epoch = new Date('2000-01-01T00:00:00.000Z');
const snowflake = new Snowflake(epoch).deconstruct('3971046231244935168');

Accessors

epoch

Get Signature

get epoch(): bigint

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:85

The epoch for this snowflake, as a bigint

Returns

bigint

---

epochNumber

Get Signature

get epochNumber(): number

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:92

The epoch for this snowflake, as a number

Returns

number

---

processId

Get Signature

get processId(): bigint

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:99

Gets the configured process ID

Returns

bigint

Set Signature

set processId(value: number | bigint): void

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:107

Sets the process ID that will be used by default for the generate method

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
value	number | bigint	The new value, will be coerced to BigInt and masked with 0b11111n

Returns

void

---

workerId

Get Signature

get workerId(): bigint

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:114

Gets the configured worker ID

Returns

bigint

Set Signature

set workerId(value: number | bigint): void

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:122

Sets the worker ID that will be used by default for the generate method

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
value	number | bigint	The new value, will be coerced to BigInt and masked with 0b11111n

Returns

void

Methods

deconstruct()

deconstruct(id: string | bigint): DeconstructedSnowflake

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:174

Deconstructs a snowflake given a snowflake ID

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
id	string | bigint	the snowflake to deconstruct

Returns

DeconstructedSnowflake

a deconstructed snowflake

Example

const epoch = new Date('2000-01-01T00:00:00.000Z');
const snowflake = new Snowflake(epoch).deconstruct('3971046231244935168');

---

generate()

generate(options: SnowflakeGenerateOptions): bigint

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:138

Generates a snowflake given an epoch and optionally a timestamp

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
options	SnowflakeGenerateOptions	options to pass into the generator, see SnowflakeGenerateOptions note when increment is not provided it defaults to the private increment of the instance

Returns

bigint

A unique snowflake

Example

const epoch = new Date('2000-01-01T00:00:00.000Z');
const snowflake = new Snowflake(epoch).generate();

---

timestampFrom()

timestampFrom(id: string | bigint): number

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:192

Retrieves the timestamp field's value from a snowflake.

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
id	string | bigint	The snowflake to get the timestamp value from.

Returns

number

The UNIX timestamp that is stored in id.

---

compare()

static compare(a: string | bigint, b: string | bigint): -1 | 0 | 1

Defined in: Snowflake.ts:215

Returns a number indicating whether a reference snowflake comes before, or after, or is same as the given snowflake in sort order.

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
a	string | bigint	The first snowflake to compare.
b	string | bigint	The second snowflake to compare.

Returns

-1 | 0 | 1

-1 if a is older than b, 0 if a and b are equals, 1 if a is newer than b.

Examples

const ids = ['737141877803057244', '1056191128120082432', '254360814063058944'];
console.log(ids.sort((a, b) => Snowflake.compare(a, b)));
// → ['254360814063058944', '737141877803057244', '1056191128120082432'];

const ids = ['737141877803057244', '1056191128120082432', '254360814063058944'];
console.log(ids.sort((a, b) => -Snowflake.compare(a, b)));
// → ['1056191128120082432', '737141877803057244', '254360814063058944'];