The Message object

The message object is the very soul of a conversation. It encapsulates all the information need in order to represent a single entry on a message list.

The message object contains these fields:

• _id: The message id
• rid: The room id - Identify the room the message belongs
• msg: The textual message
• ts: The message time stamp (date of creation on client)
• u: The user that sent the message
• _updatedAt: The time stamp when the message got saved on the server
• editedAt: (Optional) The time stamp of when the message was edited
• editedBy: (Optional) The user that editted the message
• urls: (Optional) A collection of URLs metadata. Available when the message contains at least one URL
• attachments: (Optional) A collection of attachment objects, available only when the message has at least one attachment
• alias: (Optional) A way to display the message is “sent” from someone else other than the user who sent the message
• avatar: (Optional) A url to an image, that is accessible to anyone, to display as the avatar instead of the message user’s account avatar
• groupable: (Optional) Boolean that states whether or not this message should be grouped together with other messages from the same user
• parseUrls: (Optional) Whether Rocket.Chat should try and parse the urls or not

The user presented on u and editedBy fields are a simplified version of the user information:

• _id: The user id
• username: The username

The URL metadata contains several informational fields:

• url: The URL itself (just as it appears on the message)
• meta: URL metadata (varies accord to the URL)
• headers: Some HTTP headers (varies accord to the URL)
• parsedUrl: The parsed URL broken into its parts

The attachment object can contain several fields:

• image_url: The image url of the attachment
• color: (Optional) The color of the border which displays on the left side of the attachment.

{
    "messages": [
        {
            "_id": "message-id",
            "rid": "room-id",
            "msg": "Hello World!",
            "ts": { "$date": 1480377601 },
            "u": {
                "_id": "user-id",
                "username": "username"
            },
            "_updatedAt": { "$date": 1480377601 }
        },
        {
            "_id": "message-id",
            "rid": "room-id",
            "msg": "Hello!",
            "ts": { "$date": 1480377601 },
            "u": {
                "_id": "user-id",
                "username": "username"
            },
            "_updatedAt": { "$date":1480377601 },
            "editedAt": { "$date": 1480377601 },
            "editedBy": {
                "_id": "user-id",
                "username": "username"
            }
        }
    ]
}