How Defer works

Defer is a zero-infrastructure Node.js background jobs platform.

Defer build your project from GitHub and execute your background functions on its infrastructure.

Take the following Next.js project:

- defer/
	- importContacts.ts
- pages/
	- api/
		- import.ts
- styles/
- .env.example
- package.json
- tsconfig.json

As soon as a commit is pushed on your application, Defer will get the up-to-date source code of the corresponding Git Branch and compile the background functions from the defer/ folder (more information in “Builds”).

When your API calls a background function, as follows:

import type { NextApiRequest, NextApiResponse } from "next";
import importContacts from "../../defer/importContacts";
 
type Data = {
  ok: boolean;
};
 
export default async function handler(
  req: NextApiRequest,
  res: NextApiResponse<Data>
) {
 
  await importContacts([]);
 
  res.status(200).json({ ok: true });
}

The call to the importContacts() function is actually replaced with a call to Defer's API to trigger an execution of importContacts() on Defer's Platform:

For more information on how background functions get executed, please see “Executions”.

FAQ