derby-router

Derby 0.6 router

Getting started

Install: npm install derby-router

Add the package into your derby application:

index.js

var derby = require('derby');
var app = derby.createApp('app', __filename);
 
app.use(require('derby-router'));
 
// named route
app.get('main', '/main', function(page, model, params, next){
  var self = this;
  var items = model.query('items', {});
  items.subscribe(function(){
    items.ref('_page.items');
    page.render('main');
  })
});
 
// you can access model via this.model
// and page.render via this.render()
app.get('item', '/item/:id', function(){
  var self = this;
  var item = this.model.at('items.' + this.params.id);
  item.subscribe(function(){
    item.ref('_page.item');
    self.render();
  });
});
 
// server get route
app.serverGet('time', '/api/time', function(req, res, next){
  res.json(Date.now());
});

main.html

<index:>
  <h1>Items:</h1>
 
  {{each _page.items as #item}}
 
    <!-- pathFor view function returns the right url -->
    <!-- like /item/4380fefc-001d-493a-aa2b-5e3d512e587d -->
    <a href="{{pathFor('item', #item.id)}}">{{#item.name}}</a>
  {{/each}}
 

Routes

Derby-router allows to create routes for get, post, put and del requests for both derby- and server- sides.

// Derby-app routes
app.get(...);
app.post(...);
app.put(...);
app.del(...);
 
// Server routes
app.serverGet(...);
app.serverPost(...);
app.serverPut(...);
app.serverDel(...);

Route names and paths

First two parameters in routes are name and path. For example:

app.get('main', '/main');

Their order is not actually important, so you can define the route like this:

app.get('/main', 'main');

Or simply:

app.get('main');

In the latter case the path is going to be generated automatically from the route name: 'main' -> '/main'. Here are some more examples:

This is quite convinient for sipmle paths.

It's also possible to define only paths -- in this case names are gonna be converted automatically. For example you can define the route like this:

app.get('/main');

A few more examples:

The recommended way is to define both name and path explicitly.

Path parameters

Derby-router uses path-to-regexp to parse paths. It's express-like parsing engine. Take a look at path-to-regexp docs to find out more.

Short list of possibilities:

Derby-application routes

Syntax: app.method(name?, path?, [handler]*, options?)

method: one of 'get', 'post', 'put', 'del'

name: string - name of the route, you can use it to obtain the corresponding URL using the pathFor view function.

path: string (should starts with '/')

handler: one of a list of route-handlers. You can omit it, in which case the name-template is going to be rendered. There are two types of handlers:

• handler-function
• array of route-modules (more on this later)

options - an options object. You can specify the following options:

• dontRender - boolean. By default the route's view is being rendered automatically. Set this option to true to prevent it.
• derbyController - function. Overrides default derby-app route-controller

Handler-functions

Derby-application handler-functions accept the same arguments as the original derby router: page, model, params and next. For example:

app.get('main', '/main', function(page, model, params, next){
  // ...
});

this inside handler-function is DerbyRouteController. It provides access to additional properties:

It's also possible to use several functions in one route. For example:

function isAdmin(){
  if (this.model.get('_session.user.admin'){
    this.next();
  } else {
    this.next('User should be an admin to get access!');
  }
}
 
app.get('admin', isAdmin, function(){
  // ...
});

Router modules

With derby-router you can use so called "router modules". derby-router allow you to write routes in a declarative way and to easily assemble big applications while keeping your code DRY. To achieve this you need to write so called "router modules" and plug them into various routes.

Here is a simple example:

app.get('/main', function(page, model, params, next){
  var userId = model.get('_session.userId');
  var user = model.at('users.' + userId);
 
  model.subscribe(user, function(){
    user.ref('_page.user');
    page.render('main');
  });
});

The user-subscription is a frequently used task. We usually do it in almost every route. Router-modules will help us to keep it DRY.

While working with subscriptions we often have two parts of code: before subscription and after subscription. We call this parts load-block and setup-block.

Let's write the user-module:

app.module('user', {
  load: function(){
    var userId = this.model.get('_session.userId');
    this.user = this.model.at('users.' + userId);
    this.addSubscriptions(this.user);
  },
  setup: function(){
    this.model.ref('_page.user', this.user);
  }
});

and use it in one of our handlers:

app.get('/main', function(){
  this.loadModules('user');
  // setup all loaded modules
  this.setupModules(function(){
    // by default it renders view with the name of the route.     
    // In this case it's 'main'
    this.render();
  });
});

but there is more convenient way to use router-modules:

app.get('/main', ['user']);

Let's try a more complex example. Let's say we want to subscribe to the current user and then to all of his friends.

app.get('/main', function(page, model, params, next){
  var userId = model.get('_session.userId');
  var user = model.at('users.' + userId);
 
  model.subscribe(user, function(){
    user.ref('_page.user');
 
    var friends = model.query('users', user.path('friendIds'));
 
    model.subscribe(friends, function(){
      page.render('main');
    };
  });
});

'friends' module can look something like this:

app.module('friends', {
  load: function(user){
    var friends = this.model.query('users', user.user.path('friendIds'));
    this.addSubscriptions(friends);
  }
  // We don't need setup-function here
});

Note the user argument - it's a user module. We define router like this:

app.get('/main', ['user', 'friends']);

Derby-router understands dependencies and makes "depencency injections".

Also, we can combine functions with modules, f.e.:

app.get('/main', isAdmin, ['user', 'friends']);

Extended module syntax to avoid minification issues

Insead of

app.module('friends', {
  load: function(user){
    var friends = this.model.query('users', user.user.path('friendIds'));
    this.addSubscriptions(friends);
  }
  // We don't need setup-function here
});

we can write:

app.module('friends', {
  load: ['user', function(user){
    var friends = this.model.query('users', user.user.path('friendIds'));
    this.addSubscriptions(friends);
  }]
  // We don't need setup-function here
});

It allows to avoid minification names degradation.

Server routes

Server-routes are like derby-application routes but without router-modules. They have a bit different API.

Like in derby-application routes we can use four methods to define server-routes: get, post, put, del.

Syntax: app.serverMethod(name?, path?, [handlers]*, options?)

Method: one of 'Get', 'Post', 'Put', 'Del'

name: string. Name of the route, you can use it to obtain the corresponding URL using the pathFor view function.

path: string (should starts with '/')

handlers: a list of handler-functions. You can omit it in which case nothing is going to happen.

options - an options object. You can specify the following options:

• serverController - function. Override the default server route-controller

Handler-functions

Handler-functions accept usual expressjs parameters: req, res and next. For example:

app.serverGet('api:time', '/api/time', function(req, res, next){
  res.json(Date.now());
});

this inside handler-function is ServerRouteController. It provides access to additional properties:

You can also use several functions in one route. For example:

function isAdmin(){
  if (this.model.get('_session.user.admin'){
    this.next();
  } else {
    this.next('User should be an admin to get access!');
  }
}
 
app.serverGet('admin', isAdmin, function(){
  // ...
});

The way to hide server code from browser bundle

Typical pattern is:

var derby = require('derby');
 
var app = derby.createApp('app', __filename);
 
var serverRoutes = derby.util.serverRequire(module, './server') || {};
 
// common derby-routes
app.get(...);
// ...
 
// Server-routes
app.serverPost('api:time', '/api/time', serverRoutes.time);
app.serverPost('api:foo', '/api/foo', serverRoutes.foo);
app.serverPost('api:bar', '/api/bar', serverRoutes.bar);

External routes

External routes are useful when you have a lot of external urls and you want to use them by names via pathFor-function.

app.route('twitter:search', 'https://api.twitter.com/1.1/users/search.json');
 
// ...
 
var url = app.pathFor('twitter:search', {
  $query: {
    q: 'Twitter API',
    page: 1,
    count: 3
  }
};
 
// https://api.twitter.com/1.1/users/search.json?q=Twitter%20API&page=1&count=3 
 
$.get(url, function(err, data){
  // ....
});

route-function has two hard-coded parameters: name and path.

View-function pathFor

For all routes we can get a specific url in templates using view-function pathFor, for example:

app.get('item', '/items/:id', function(){
  // ...
});

<a href="{{pathFor('item', #item.id)}}">{{#item.name}}</a>

Also you can use pathFor function right in the code:

  var url = app.pathFor('item', itemId);
  // ...

There are two syntaxes for pathFor-function:

Simple syntax: pathFor(name, [param1, param2, ...])

• name - route-name
• param1, paramN - route parameters in the same order as params of route-path, for example:

app.get('foobar', '/new/:foo/:bar+/(.*)', function(){
  // ...
});

<!-- here we get /new/one/two/three/four url -->
<a href="{{pathFor('foobar', 'one', 'two', 'three/four')}}">foobar</a>

Object syntax: pathFor(name, options)

• name - route-name
• options - object with named route params, for example:

app.get('foobar', '/new/:foo/:bar+/(.*)', function(){
  // ...
});

<!-- here we get /new/one/two/three/four url -->
<a href="{{pathFor('foobar', {foo: 'one', bar: ['two', 'three'], 0: 'four'})}}">
  foobar
</a>

Note 0 param. For unnamed params like (.*) we use number-keys.

Query and hash

Additionally we can pass two special params in the pathFor options:

• $query - query string or query-object
• $hash - hash string

For example:

app.get('main', '/main', function(){
  // ...
});

<!-- here we get /main?foo=abc#bar url -->
<a href="{{pathFor('main', {$query: {foo: 'abc'}, $hash: 'bar'})}}">foobar</a>

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2015 by Artur Zayats

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.