A currently poorly documented feature in the Azure Mobile Services JavaScript backend is the ability to send along system properties, such as __createdAt and __updatedAt, back to the client by default. After a few hours of digging through documentation, MSDN blog posts, and Stack Overflow, I've finally found a working solution.
In your read methods, supply a systemProperties property with an array of fields you want returned:
exports.get = function(request, response) { var myTable = request.service.tables.getTable('MyTable');
myTable.read({ systemProperties: \['\_\_createdAt', '\_\_updatedAt'\], success: function(tableEntries) { // So on and so forth } } }You can also specify that you want all fields:
exports.get = function(request, response) { var myTable = request.service.tables.getTable('MyTable');
myTable.read({ systemProperties: \['\*'\], success: function(tableEntries) { // So on and so forth } } }A similar technique can be applied to table scripts. Specify the systemProperties property in the request's execute function:
function insert(item, user, request) { request.execute({ systemProperties: \['\_\_createdAt', '\_\_updatedAt'\] }); }Something to keep in mind with tables is that you can add a query parameter to show these properties without changing the JavaScript. For example, you could go to http://my-ams-site.azure-mobile.net/tables/MyTable?__systemProperties=* and it would display all system properties.
If you're using the code editor in the Azure Management Portal, be sure to restart your service to see changes applied. I kept forgetting to restart and I wouldn't see the results right away.