Life before knowing dedent

Have you ever tried to write multi-line paragraph in template literal, but realized it preserves indentation, which ended up using string addition with \n?

function explain() {
  const description = `
    - 200 OK
      The request succeeded. The result meaning of "success" depends on the HTTP method:

      * GET: The resource has been fetched...
      * HEAD: The representation headers are...
      * PUT or POST: The resource describing...
      * TRACE: The message body contains the...
  `

  console.log(description)
}

explain()

$ bun index.ts

    - 200 OK
      The request succeeded. The result meaning of "success" depends on the HTTP method:

      * GET: The resource has been fetched...
      * HEAD: The representation headers are...
      * PUT or POST: The resource describing...
      * TRACE: The message body contains the...

Wait, do I need to remove the indentations?
Nah. I can't give up my beautifully formatted code.

function explain() {
  const description = '- 200 OK\n'  
    'The request succeeded. The result meaning of "success" depends on the HTTP method:\n\n'  
    '  * GET: The resource has been fetched...\n'  
    '  * HEAD: The representation headers are...\n'  
    '  * PUT or POST: The resource describing...\n'  
    '  * TRACE: The message body contains the...\n'

  console.log(description)
}

explain()

I'll take that. ?

For this reason, multiline text is always a headache for me.

Now you know dedent

But now, you don't have to negotiate with yourself anymore. Just use dedent.

import dedent from 'dedent'

function explain() {
  const description = dedent`
    - 200 OK
      The request succeeded. The result meaning of "success" depends on the HTTP method:

      * GET: The resource has been fetched...
      * HEAD: The representation headers are...
      * PUT or POST: The resource describing...
      * TRACE: The message body contains the...
  `

  console.log(description)
}

explain()

What I did was add dedent before the template literal. You don't believe it?

$ bun index.ts
- 200 OK
  The request succeeded. The result meaning of "success" depends on the HTTP method:

  * GET: The resource has been fetched...
  * HEAD: The representation headers are...
  * PUT or POST: The resource describing...
  * TRACE: The message body contains the...

It removes all the unnecessary indentation and makes it as we expected.

Why don't we try a more complex one?

import dedent from 'dedent'

const explainStatus = (status: string) => {
    switch(status) {
        case '2xx':
          return dedent`
            - 200 OK
              The request succeeded. The result meaning of "success" depends on the HTTP method:

              * GET: The resource has been fetched and transmitted in the message body.
              * HEAD: The representation headers are included in the response without any message body.
              * PUT or POST: The resource describing the result of the action is transmitted in the message body.
              * TRACE: The message body contains the request message as received by the server.

            - 201 Created
              The request succeeded, and a new resource was created as a result.
              This is typically the response sent after POST requests, or some PUT requests.
            `

        case '4xx':
          return dedent`
            - 400 Bad Request
              The server cannot or will not process the request due to something that is perceived to be a client error
              (e.g., malformed request syntax, invalid request message framing, or deceptive request routing).

            - 401 Unauthorized
              Although the HTTP standard specifies "unauthorized", semantically this response means "unauthenticated".
              That is, the client must authenticate itself to get the requested response.
          `

          default:
            return 'not yet!'
      }
}

console.log(explainStatus('2xx'))

$ bun index.ts
- 200 OK
  The request succeeded. The result meaning of "success" depends on the HTTP method:

  * GET: The resource has been fetched and transmitted in the message body.
  * HEAD: The representation headers are included in the response without any message body.
  * PUT or POST: The resource describing the result of the action is transmitted in the message body.
  * TRACE: The message body contains the request message as received by the server.

- 201 Created
  The request succeeded, and a new resource was created as a result.
  This is typically the response sent after POST requests, or some PUT requests.

Soo smoooth!?