Node

Install

npm install @russellthehippo/honker-node

The package ships a native .node binding for supported release targets.

Open

const honker = require("@russellthehippo/honker-node");

const db = honker.open("app.db", undefined, "shm");

The third argument selects the watcher backend. Use undefined or "polling" for the stable default, "kernel" for filesystem wake hints, or "shm" for the WAL-index fast path.

Queue

const q = db.queue("emails");
q.enqueue({ to: "alice@example.com", orderId: 42 });

const job = q.claimOne("worker-1");
if (job) {
  await sendEmail(job.payload);
  job.ack();
}

Transactional Outbox

const outbox = db.outbox("email", async (payload) => {
  await sendEmail(payload);
});

const tx = db.transaction();
try {
  tx.execute("INSERT INTO orders (id, total) VALUES (?, ?)", [42, 9900]);
  outbox.enqueueTx(tx, { orderId: 42 });
  tx.commit();
} catch (error) {
  tx.rollback();
  throw error;
}

await outbox.runWorker("email-worker");

Outbox jobs retry with backoff when delivery throws.

ORM Section

For better-sqlite3, Drizzle, or Kysely-on-SQLite, load the Honker extension on the connection your ORM uses and run Honker SQL inside the ORM transaction. Prisma owns its SQLite connection more tightly, so the fully atomic path is to put the enqueue-critical write in a small explicit SQLite transaction outside Prisma or accept that a second Honker connection is not atomic with Prisma’s write.

See the full JavaScript / TypeScript ORM recipe for Drizzle, Kysely, and Prisma-adjacent patterns.

Testing

Use Node’s test runner with a temporary file-backed database and spawn worker processes for queue/outbox proofs. That catches native extension loading and watcher behavior in the same shape production uses.