/freeway

Simple Routing for EE

Primary LanguagePHP

Freeway - Simple Routing for EE

Freeway adds routes (a common web application concept) to EE. You set the routes in your Freeway settings like so, and just separate them with linebreaks:

journals/{{user}} => blogs/users/{{user}}

If you set a route like this, visitors should be able to visit "journals/admin", but their request will be interpreted by EE as "blogs/users/admin/". EE will load the blogs template group and the user template. Segments one, two, and three will be blogs, users, and admin. Additionally, "admin" will be available in the template as {freeway_user}. So, that's fun.

Why?

See Issue #1. Routes are a valuable concept because they separate your URLs from your data. They make more sense in an MVC application, but in EE, they provide added power and flexibility around your URLs.

Usage

  • Install Freeway in your third_party folder

  • Enable it on the Addon -> Extensions page

  • Set routes on the extension settings page. A route looks like this:

      /blog/{{username}}/{{category}} => /blog/category/{{category}}

    In this case, a URL like "blog/davery/css" will be treated, in EE, as "blog/category/css". Several variables will be available in the template:

      {freeway_username} - davery
  {freeway_category} - css
  {freeway_1} - blog
  {freeway_2} - davery
  {freeway_3} - css
  {freeway_4+} - (blank)
  {freeway_info} - debug info from Freeway

  • Template variables:

    • {freeway_[varname]} - the value of {{varname}} in the URL match
    • {freeway_1}, {freeway_2} - "original" segments, the one you see in your browser bar
    • {segment_1}, {segment_2} - "parsed" segments, the ones EE is sent
    • {freeway_info} - debug info from Freeway

Example Settings/Template

Installed Freeway, but still don't get it? Try the following settings:

journals => blogs/
journals/{{user}} => blogs/users/{{user}}
product/{{product_id}}/{{action}} => catalog/product_lookup/id/{{product_id}}/{{action}}

Then, set the following code in your index template:

<p>EE parses the current URI as:
	<strong>
		/ {segment_1}
		{if segment_2}/ {segment_2}{/if}
		{if segment_3}/ {segment_3}{/if}
		{if segment_4}/ {segment_4}{/if}
		{if segment_5}/ {segment_5}{/if}
		{if segment_6}/ {segment_6}{/if}
	</strong>
</p>

<p>The original URI has been stored:
	<strong>
		/ {freeway_1}
		{if freeway_2}/ {freeway_2}{/if}
		{if freeway_3}/ {freeway_3}{/if}
		{if freeway_4}/ {freeway_4}{/if}
		{if freeway_5}/ {freeway_5}{/if}
		{if freeway_6}/ {freeway_6}{/if}
	</strong>
</p>

<p>And some variables have been saved:<br>
	<strong>
	freeway_user: {freeway_user}<br>
	freeway_product_id: {freeway_product_id}<br>
	freeway_action: {freeway_action}
	</strong>
</p>

<p>
	<a href="/product/42423423/buy/" target="_blank">/product/42423423/buy/</a><br>
	<a href="/journals/" target="_blank">/journals</a><br>
	<a href="/journals/jimmy/" target="_blank">/journals/jimmy</a><br>
</p>

<hr>
{freeway_info}

You should be able to click around and watch the segments and variables update.

Future Ideas

  • Route partial segments through, like /foo{{bar}}/ => /category-{{bar}}/
  • Run common queries like category_id on tokens before passing them on to new ones (example: {{category from=cat_name to=cat_id}} would take the cat name, but return te id