Trouble retrieving full user data on login with TypeScript and Node.js backend

Backend
1

I’m working on a project with a Flutter frontend and a Node.js + TypeScript backend. I’m having issues getting all the user info when they log in. I followed a tutorial but can’t get the same results.

Here’s what I’m getting:

{
  "message": "Login successful",
  "token": "eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9..."
}

But I want something like this:

{
  "user": {
    "id": "user123",
    "username": "johndoe",
    "email": "john@example.com",
    "created_at": "2025-05-09T06:23:54.778Z",
    "updated_at": "2025-05-09T06:23:54.778Z",
    "token": "eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9..."
  }
}

My login function looks like this:

async function signIn(req, res) {
  const { email, password } = req.body;
  try {
    const userResult = await db.query('SELECT * FROM users WHERE email = $1', [email]);
    const user = userResult.rows[0];
    if (!user || !await comparePasswords(password, user.password)) {
      return res.status(401).json({ error: 'Wrong email or password' });
    }
    const authToken = generateToken({ userId: user.id });
    res.json({ message: 'Login successful', token: authToken });
  } catch (error) {
    res.status(500).json({ error: 'Login failed', details: error.message });
  }
}

How can I modify this to return the full user object with the token?

2

hey leo, i had similar issues. try this:

after generating the token, create a new object with user info + token:

const userResponse = {
  id: user.id,
  username: user.username,
  email: user.email,
  created_at: user.created_at,
  updated_at: user.updated_at,
  token: authToken
};

res.json({ user: userResponse });

this should give u the format u want. lmk if it works!

3

heyy leo! Have u considered using object destructuring? it’s super handy for this kinda stuff. try something like:

const { password, …userInfo } = user;
res.json({ user: { …userInfo, token: authToken } });

this way u get all the user data without sending the password. what do u think? would that work for ur project?

4

To return the full user object along with the token, you can modify your signIn function like this:

async function signIn(req, res) {
  const { email, password } = req.body;
  try {
    const userResult = await db.query('SELECT * FROM users WHERE email = $1', [email]);
    const user = userResult.rows[0];
    if (!user || !await comparePasswords(password, user.password)) {
      return res.status(401).json({ error: 'Wrong email or password' });
    }
    const token = generateToken({ userId: user.id });
    const { password: _, ...userWithoutPassword } = user;
    res.json({ user: { ...userWithoutPassword, token } });
  } catch (error) {
    res.status(500).json({ error: 'Login failed', details: error.message });
  }
}

This approach removes the password field from the user object for security, then merges the remaining user details with the token, which will return a JSON structure similar to your desired output.