Can't return a string properly with mongoskin

Question

So I have this script:

var db = require('mongoskin').db('localhost:27017/titles', {safe:true});
var titles = db.collection('titles');

title = titles.findOne(function(err, result){
if (err) throw err;
return result.title;
});

console.log(title)

And this BSON object in the collection:

{"title": "Hello World", "postNumber": 0, "_id": ObjectId("509eeffbf8f11e8813000001")}

My goal is got get the string "Hello World" to output to the console, but instead I get this:

{ emitter: { _events: { open: [Object] }, _maxListeners: 50 },
  state: 1,
  options: undefined,
  skinDb:
   { emitter: { _events: [Object], _maxListeners: 100 },
     state: 1,
     _dbconn:
      { databaseName: 'titles',
    serverConfig: [Object],
    options: [Object],
    _applicationClosed: false,
    native_parser: true,
    bsonLib: [Object],
    bson: {},
    bson_deserializer: [Object],
    bson_serializer: [Object],
    _state: 'connecting',
    pkFactory: [Object],
    forceServerObjectId: false,
    safe: true,
    notReplied: {},
    isInitializing: true,
    auths: [],
    openCalled: true,
    commands: [],
    _callBackStore: [Object],
    logger: [Object],
    slaveOk: false,
    tag: 1352682584657,
    eventHandlers: [Object],
    serializeFunctions: false,
    raw: false,
    recordQueryStats: false,
    reaperEnabled: false,
    _lastReaperTimestamp: 1352682584657,
    retryMiliSeconds: 1000,
    numberOfRetries: 60,
    reaperInterval: 10000,
    reaperTimeout: 30000,
    readPreference: undefined },
 db: null,
 username: '',
 password: undefined,
 admin: { emitter: {}, state: 0, skinDb: [Circular], admin: null },
 _collections: { titles: [Circular] },
 bson_serializer:
  { BSON: [Object],
    Long: [Object],
    ObjectID: [Object],
    DBRef: [Function: DBRef],
    Code: [Function: Code],
    Timestamp: [Object],
    Binary: [Object],
    Double: [Function: Double],
    MaxKey: [Function: MaxKey],
    MinKey: [Function: MinKey],
    Symbol: [Function: Symbol] },
 ObjectID:
  { [Function: ObjectID]
    index: 0,
    createPk: [Function: createPk],
    createFromTime: [Function: createFromTime],
    createFromHexString: [Function: createFromHexString] } },
  ObjectID:
   { [Function: ObjectID]
 index: 0,
 createPk: [Function: createPk],
 createFromTime: [Function: createFromTime],
 createFromHexString: [Function: createFromHexString] },
  collectionName: 'titles',
  collection: null,
  internalHint: null,
  hint: [Getter/Setter] }

It works just fine when I put the console.log() inside the function, I just can't return the string for some reason.

Solved:

read = function(callback){
    titles.findOne(function(err, result){
        if (err) throw err;
        callback(result.title);
    });
};

read(function(title){
console.log(title);
});

Answer 1

you need to understand javascript callback.

1 - findOne will return a db object not the result of your string. I never read the mongoskin doco but I think it will be a db collection or some sort which is what you see in the console.log print out. 2 - in the callback your do return result.title; will never return the title back as you would expect. so that is why I suggest to do some reading on how callback work.

The correct way to print the title will be putting the console.log inside the callback function as you mention.