Logo

Synopsis

Director is a router. Routing is the process of determining what code to run when a URL is requested.

Motivation

A routing library that works in both the browser and node.js environments with as few differences as possible. Simplifies the development of Single Page Apps and Node.js applications. Dependency free (doesn't require jQuery or Express, etc).

Status

Features

Client-Side Routing
Server-Side HTTP Routing
Server-Side CLI Routing

Usage

API Documentation
Frequently Asked Questions

Building client-side script

Run the provided CLI script.

./bin/build

Client-side Routing

It simply watches the hash of the URL to determine what to do, for example:

http://foo.com/#/bar

Client-side routing (aka hash-routing) allows you to specify some information about the state of the application using the URL. So that when the user visits a specific URL, the application can be transformed accordingly.

Hash route

Here is a simple example:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <title>A Gentle Introduction</title>

    <script
      src="https://rawgit.com/flatiron/director/master/build/director.min.js">
    </script>

    <script>
      var author = function () { console.log("author"); };
      var books = function () { console.log("books"); };
      var viewBook = function (bookId) {
        console.log("viewBook: bookId is populated: " + bookId);
      };

      var routes = {
        '/author': author,
        '/books': [books, function() {
          console.log("An inline route handler.");
        }],
        '/books/view/:bookId': viewBook
      };

      var router = Router(routes);

      router.init();
    </script>
  </head>

  <body>
    <ul>
      <li><a href="#/author">#/author</a></li>
      <li><a href="#/books">#/books</a></li>
      <li><a href="#/books/view/1">#/books/view/1</a></li>
    </ul>
  </body>
</html>

Director works great with your favorite DOM library, such as jQuery.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <title>A Gentle Introduction 2</title>

    <script
      src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.1.1/jquery.min.js">
    </script>

    <script
      src="https://rawgit.com/flatiron/director/master/build/director.min.js">
    </script>

    <script>
    $('document').ready(function() {
      //
      // create some functions to be executed when
      // the correct route is issued by the user.
      //
      var showAuthorInfo = function () { console.log("showAuthorInfo"); };
      var listBooks = function () { console.log("listBooks"); };

      var allroutes = function() {
        var route = window.location.hash.slice(2);
        var sections = $('section');
        var section;

        section = sections.filter('[data-route=' + route + ']');

        if (section.length) {
          sections.hide(250);
          section.show(250);
        }
      };

      //
      // define the routing table.
      //
      var routes = {
        '/author': showAuthorInfo,
        '/books': listBooks
      };

      //
      // instantiate the router.
      //
      var router = Router(routes);

      //
      // a global configuration setting.
      //
      router.configure({
        on: allroutes
      });

      router.init();
    });
    </script>
  </head>

  <body>
    <section data-route="author">Author Name</section>
    <section data-route="books">Book1, Book2, Book3</section>
    <ul>
      <li><a href="#/author">#/author</a></li>
      <li><a href="#/books">#/books</a></li>
    </ul>
  </body>
</html>

You can find a browser-specific build of director [here][1] which has all of the server code stripped away.

Server-Side HTTP Routing

Director handles routing for HTTP requests similar to journey or express:

  //
  // require the native http module, as well as director.
  //
  var http = require('http'),
      director = require('director');

  //
  // create some logic to be routed to.
  //
  function helloWorld() {
    this.res.writeHead(200, { 'Content-Type': 'text/plain' })
    this.res.end('hello world');
  }

  //
  // define a routing table.
  //
  var router = new director.http.Router({
    '/hello': {
      get: helloWorld
    }
  });

  //
  // setup a server and when there is a request, dispatch the
  // route that was requested in the request object.
  //
  var server = http.createServer(function (req, res) {
    router.dispatch(req, res, function (err) {
      if (err) {
        res.writeHead(404);
        res.end();
      }
    });
  });

  //
  // You can also do ad-hoc routing, similar to `journey` or `express`.
  // This can be done with a string or a regexp.
  //
  router.get('/bonjour', helloWorld);
  router.get(/hola/, helloWorld);

  //
  // set the server to listen on port `8080`.
  //
  server.listen(8080);

Server-Side CLI Routing

Director supports Command Line Interface routing. Routes for cli options are based on command line input (i.e. process.argv) instead of a URL.

  var director = require('director');

  var router = new director.cli.Router();

  router.on('create', function () {
    console.log('create something');
  });

  router.on(/destroy/, function () {
    console.log('destroy something');
  });

  // You will need to dispatch the cli arguments yourself
  router.dispatch('on', process.argv.slice(2).join(' '));

Using the cli router, you can dispatch commands by passing them as a string. For example, if this example is in a file called foo.js:

$ node foo.js create
create something
$ node foo.js destroy
destroy something

API Documentation

Constructor
Routing Table
Adhoc Routing
Scoped Routing
Routing Events
Configuration
URL Matching
URL Parameters
Wildcard routes
Route Recursion
Async Routing
Resources
History API
Instance Methods
Attach Properties to this
HTTP Streaming and Body Parsing

Constructor

  var router = Router(routes);

Routing Table

An object literal that contains nested route definitions. A potentially nested set of key/value pairs. The keys in the object literal represent each potential part of the URL. The values in the object literal contain references to the functions that should be associated with them. bark and meow are two functions that you have defined in your code.

  //
  // Assign routes to an object literal.
  //
  var routes = {
    //
    // a route which assigns the function `bark`.
    //
    '/dog': bark,
    //
    // a route which assigns the functions `meow` and `scratch`.
    //
    '/cat': [meow, scratch]
  };

  //
  // Instantiate the router.
  //
  var router = Router(routes);

Adhoc Routing

When developing large client-side or server-side applications it is not always possible to define routes in one location. Usually individual decoupled components register their own routes with the application router. We refer to this as Adhoc Routing. Lets take a look at the API director exposes for adhoc routing:

Client-side Routing

  var router = new Router().init();

  router.on('/some/resource', function () {
    //
    // Do something on `/#/some/resource`
    //
  });

HTTP Routing

  var router = new director.http.Router();

  router.get(/\/some\/resource/, function () {
    //
    // Do something on an GET to `/some/resource`
    //
  });

Scoped Routing

In large web appliations, both Client-side and Server-side, routes are often scoped within a few individual resources. Director exposes a simple way to do this for Adhoc Routing scenarios:

  var router = new director.http.Router();

  //
  // Create routes inside the `/users` scope.
  //
  router.path(/\/users\/(\w+)/, function () {
    //
    // The `this` context of the function passed to `.path()`
    // is the Router itself.
    //

    this.post(function (id) {
      //
      // Create the user with the specified `id`.
      //
    });

    this.get(function (id) {
      //
      // Retreive the user with the specified `id`.
      //
    });

    this.get(/\/friends/, function (id) {
      //
      // Get the friends for the user with the specified `id`.
      //
    });
  });

Routing Events

In director, a "routing event" is a named property in the Routing Table which can be assigned to a function or an Array of functions to be called when a route is matched in a call to router.dispatch().

on: A function or Array of functions to execute when the route is matched.
before: A function or Array of functions to execute before calling the on method(s).

Client-side only

after: A function or Array of functions to execute when leaving a particular route.
once: A function or Array of functions to execute only once for

Director

Install / Use

README