# Mongoose

# Middleware

Middleware are defined at the Schema level and are applied when the methods `init` (when a document is initialized with data from MongoDB), `save`, and `remove` are called on a document instance.

There are two types of middleware, serial and parallel.

Serial middleware are defined like:

    schema.pre('save', function (next) {
      // ...
    })

They're executed one after the other, when each middleware calls `next`.

Parallel middleware offer more fine-grained flow control, and are defined like

    schema.pre('remove', true, function (next, done) {
      // ...
    })

Parallel middleware can `next()` immediately, but the final argument will be called when all the parallel middleware have called `done()`.

## Use cases

Middleware are useful for:

- Complex validation
- Removing dependent documents when a certain document is removed (eg: removing a user removes all his blogposts)
- Asynchronous defaults
- Asynchronous tasks that a certain action triggers. For example:
  - Triggering custom events
  - Creating notifications
  - Emails

and many other things. They're specially useful for atomizing model logic and avoiding nested blocks of async code.

## Error handling

If any middleware calls `next` or `done` with an `Error` instance, the flow is interrupted, and the error is passed to the callback.

For example:

    schema.pre('save', function (next) {
        // something goes wrong
        next(new Error('something went wrong'));
    });

    // later...

    myModel.save(function (err) {
      // err can come from a middleware
    });