• 23/1/2015:
  • Full support for Semantic UI
  • Breaking change in 'getFileInfo', 'getDirectory' and 'finished' callbacks, which is now passing fileInfo object instead of just a file name and folder. See documentation.
  • Possibility to automatically create directories on server
  • Possibility to delete files on server with UploadServer.delete(path), see DEMO
  • Possibility to easily modify the looks of the upload component or even add new upload templates for various frameworks by modifying the Uploader.UI. classes
  • Several bug fixes
  • Update the DEMO application to showcase all current possibilities
• 1/12/2014 Now with drag and drop support!!!

These packages allow you to easily setup a file upload service to your Meteor server. This solution has following perks:

1. Uses the famous jQuery file upload system from blueimp.
   1. As a result you can upload any file size (default limit 11GB)
   2. Displays upload progress
   3. Uploads can be canceled
   4. You can upload multiple files
   5. Images can be resized to various sizes using the imagemagick
2. NEW! Support for Semantic UI!
3. NEW! You can use drag and drop to upload your files!
4. Saves and serves file from arbitrary folder on your server. This solves problems with hot-code reload, when files are saved into Meteor's public directory
   1. Possibility to save files to subfolders
   2. Possibility to rename files on the server
5. Simple configuration and installation! No need to install 10+ packages like with Collection-FS solution

Please note that since we are using blueimp's juery solution, this solution has a full potential of performing client image resizes, chunked uploads, upload resume and more. These features will be gradually added. Pull requests are welcome!

For all the screen-shots, please scroll to the bottom of the page.

Install packages

$ meteor add tomi:upload-server
$ meteor add tomi:upload-jquery

Create directory in the application root

mkdir -p .uploads/tmp

Configure server

//file:/server/init.js
Meteor.startup(function () {
  UploadServer.init({
    tmpDir: process.env.PWD + '/.uploads/tmp',
    uploadDir: process.env.PWD + '/.uploads/',
    checkCreateDirectories: true //create the directories for you
  })
});

Use template with bootstrap or semantic UI support

<template name="yourTemplate">
	{{> upload_bootstrap }}
</template>

<template name="yourTemplate">
	{{> upload_semanticUI }}
</template>

DONE!

You can also use the drag and drop zone!

<template name="yourTemplate">
	{{> dropzone }}
</template>

If you are using dropzone, you may want to set-up some css styles to give your user some visual cues:

.jqDropZone {
    background: lightgrey;
    width: 150px;
    height: 50px;
    line-height: 50px;
    text-align: center;
    font-weight: bold;
}
.jqDropZone.in {
    width: 600px;
    height: 200px;
    line-height: 200px;
    font-size: larger;
}
.jqDropZone.hover {
    background: lawngreen;
}
.jqDropZone.fade {
    -webkit-transition: all 0.3s ease-out;
    -moz-transition: all 0.3s ease-out;
    -ms-transition: all 0.3s ease-out;
    -o-transition: all 0.3s ease-out;
    transition: all 0.3s ease-out;
    opacity: 1;
}

The installation is very simple and consists of installing two packages:

$ meteor add tomi:upload-server
$ meteor add tomi:upload-jquery

I have separated these two packages, because often you will want to run your upload service as a separate application. There are several options supported by blueimp, such as Java, ASP, Ruby and more or even node.js Express server installed via NPM. If you wish to use self standing server, install only the tomi:upload-jquery package.

First, we need to initialise the server and configure upload paths. We also allow server to create directories for us:

//file:/server/init.js
Meteor.startup(function () {
  UploadServer.init({
    tmpDir: '/Users/tomi/Documents/Uploads/tmp',
    uploadDir: '/Users/tomi/Documents/Uploads/',
    checkCreateDirectories: true,
    getDirectory: function(fileInfo, formData) {
      // create a sub-directory in the uploadDir based on the content type (e.g. 'images')
      return formData.contentType;
    },
    finished: function(fileInfo, formFields) {
      // perform a disk operation
    }
  })
});

Following options are available for UploadServer.init(options):

In callbacks we pass the fileInfo with the following structure:

On client we have a possibility to use pre-defined templates for Bootstrap or Semantic UI, or use the dropzone. We can use several upload forms on the page. We can provide extra data to upload control via formData parameter. We can also limit the file type available for the file picker using parameter fileTypes. Following is an example of how you can include the upload form on your page:

<template name="home">
    <h3>Images</h3>
    {{> upload_bootstrap fileTypes='.jpg' multiple=true formData=specificFormData }}
</template>

or

<template name="home">
    <h3>Drag and drop image on the target area</h3>
    {{> dropzone contentType='images' fileTypes='.jpg' multiple=true formData=specificFormData }}
</template>

Following options are available for the template:

We can also hook onto upload callbacks just like following:

// file: client/init.js
Meteor.startup(function() {
  Uploader.finished = function(fileInfo, templateContext) {
    Uploads.insert(fileInfo);
  }
})

If you wish to use custom URL for your uploads this can be configured as following:

Uploader.uploadUrl = 'http://yoururl';

• 503 (Service Unavailable) can have following two reasons
  • You have incorrectly set up your directories for upload or directories have no rights for writing. Please check your server console for any messages.
  • If server console is clean, the problem could be on client with JS debugging tools such as Firebug. Please disable any JS debugging tool and restart your browser. Problem should disappear.

Single file image upload with preview:

Multiple file upload with queue:

Dropzone