javascript FileReader - parsing long file in chunks

Question

I have long file I need to parse. Because it's very long I need to do it chunk by chunk. I tried this:

function parseFile(file){
    var chunkSize = 2000;
    var fileSize = (file.size - 1);

    var foo = function(e){
        console.log(e.target.result);
    };

    for(var i =0; i < fileSize; i += chunkSize)
    {
        (function( fil, start ) {
            var reader = new FileReader();
            var blob = fil.slice(start, chunkSize + 1);
            reader.onload = foo;
            reader.readAsText(blob);
        })( file, i );
    }
}

After running it I see only the first chunk in the console. If I change 'console.log' to jquery append to some div I see only first chunk in that div. What about other chunks? How to make it work?

Answer 1

FileReader API is asynchronous so you should handle it with block calls. A for loop wouldn't do the trick since it wouldn't wait for each read to complete before reading the next chunk. Here's a working approach.

function parseFile(file, callback) {
    var fileSize   = file.size;
    var chunkSize  = 64 * 1024; // bytes
    var offset     = 0;
    var self       = this; // we need a reference to the current object
    var chunkReaderBlock = null;

    var readEventHandler = function(evt) {
        if (evt.target.error == null) {
            offset += evt.target.result.length;
            callback(evt.target.result); // callback for handling read chunk
        } else {
            console.log("Read error: " + evt.target.error);
            return;
        }
        if (offset >= fileSize) {
            console.log("Done reading file");
            return;
        }

        // of to the next chunk
        chunkReaderBlock(offset, chunkSize, file);
    }

    chunkReaderBlock = function(_offset, length, _file) {
        var r = new FileReader();
        var blob = _file.slice(_offset, length + _offset);
        r.onload = readEventHandler;
        r.readAsText(blob);
    }

    // now let's start the read with the first block
    chunkReaderBlock(offset, chunkSize, file);
}