How can I efficiently bulk upsert RSS feed items into Supabase with n8n?

Below is one potential approach that may simplify your workflow. Rather than iterating over each feed item one by one and handling errors individually, you may be able to perform a bulk upsert, provided your Supabase operation supports handling arrays of records.

Key Points

• Bulk Upsert:
  Instead of using a loop node to send one item per request, you can prepare an array containing all feed items (or an array of objects with only the fields needed, for example an ID along with feed details). Then, in a single Supabase node operation, you can pass that array to the upsert method. For example, if you have already gathered 100 items from your RSS feed into an array, you can supply that array directly.

• Using the Upsert Method:
  Supabase’s upsert API supports bulk upserts. For instance, in JavaScript (or in a Supabase node that passes the data directly), you would call:

  JSCopied
  const { data, error } = await supabase
    .from('your_table_name')
    .upsert(yourArrayOfFeedItems)
    .select();

  In n8n’s Supabase node, this typically means mapping the entire array output from an upstream node directly to the upsert operation.

• Error Handling & Slack Notifications:
  Bulk upsert operations will return the rows that were inserted or updated in a single response. This might make it less straightforward to know which individual items were new versus updated. If you need this granularity (for example, to send Slack messages only when a new row is inserted), you might need to process the returned data to determine which ones are new. Alternatively, if your use case allows, consider doing a bulk upsert first and then running a follow-up node (or a Function node) to compare the input feed with the output data from the upsert call.

Example Workflow Approach

1. Feed Items to Bulk Array:
   Use a Code/Function node to convert your RSS feed output into an array of objects conforming to your Supabase table structure.

   JAVASCRIPTCopied
   // Example: mapping feed items to the expected schema
   const feedItems = items.map(item => ({
     id: item.json.id,
     title: item.json.title,
     published: item.json.published, // etc…
   }));
   return feedItems;

2. Bulk Upsert in Supabase Node:
   Configure your Supabase node to use the upsert operation and pass the output array from the Code node. Make sure your node configuration maps the data correctly.

3. Optional – Post-Processing:
   If you need to send alerts via Slack based on changed rows, add a node after the Supabase node that checks which rows were newly created versus updated. This may involve comparing the input data with the returned data.

Final Thoughts

If you decide to go with a bulk approach, you remove the need for looping over each feed item individually, which should simplify your workflow and reduce the number of calls to Supabase. However, keep in mind that this design change may require some adjustments in error handling and in tracking which items trigger alerts in Slack.

Give bulk upserting a try and, if the Supabase node in n8n supports it as expected, you should see a cleaner, more efficient workflow.