Routing

Routing determines how your application responds to incoming HTTP requests. In Rage, routes connect URLs to controller actions and are defined in the config/routes.rb file.

When a request comes in, Rage's router matches it against your defined routes and dispatches it to the appropriate controller action.

info

Refer to the API Documentation for a complete set of router methods.

Resource Routing

The resources helper is the quickest way to create routes for RESTful controllers. It automatically generates all five standard REST routes with a single line of code.

Add this to your routes file:

config/routes.rb

Rage.routes.draw do
  resources :users
end

This single declaration creates all the routes you need for a typical REST resource:

HTTP Method	URL	Controller	Action	Purpose
GET	/users	UsersController	index	List all users
POST	/users	UsersController	create	Create a new user
GET	/users/:id	UsersController	show	Show a specific user
PATCH/PUT	/users/:id	UsersController	update	Update a user
DELETE	/users/:id	UsersController	destroy	Delete a user

Routes with :id in the URL automatically make that value available in your controller via params[:id].

Limiting Generated Routes

Sometimes you don't need all five REST actions. Use the :only option to generate only the routes you need:

config/routes.rb

Rage.routes.draw do
  resources :users, only: [:index, :show]
end

This creates only two routes instead of five:

HTTP Method	URL	Controller	Action
GET	/users	UsersController	index
GET	/users/:id	UsersController	show

Alternatively, you can use :except to exclude specific actions:

config/routes.rb

Rage.routes.draw do
  resources :users, except: [:destroy]
end

This generates all routes except destroy, which might be useful if you want to prevent users from being deleted through the API.

Namespaces

Namespaces help you organize routes into logical groups, which is especially useful for API versioning or admin sections. They prefix both the URL path and the controller module:

config/routes.rb

Rage.routes.draw do
  namespace :v1 do
    resources :users
  end
end

This generates routes under the /v1 path and expects controllers in the V1:: module:

HTTP Method	URL	Controller	Action
GET	/v1/users	V1::UsersController	index
POST	/v1/users	V1::UsersController	create
GET	/v1/users/:id	V1::UsersController	show
PATCH/PUT	/v1/users/:id	V1::UsersController	update
DELETE	/v1/users/:id	V1::UsersController	destroy

Your controller file would be located at app/controllers/v1/users_controller.rb and defined as class V1::UsersController.

Custom Routing

While resources handles most cases, sometimes you need more control over your routes. Rage provides HTTP method helpers (get, post, put, patch, delete) for defining custom routes.

Here's an example controller with a custom action:

app/controllers/user_messages_controller.rb

class UserMessagesController < ApplicationController
  def mark_as_read
    message = Message.find_by(id: params[:message_id], user_id: params[:user_id])
    message.mark_as_read
  end
end

You can map this to a custom URL like this:

config/routes.rb

Rage.routes.draw do
  post "/messages/:user_id/:message_id/read", to: "user_messages#mark_as_read"
end

Breaking this down:

• post - specifies the HTTP method
• "/messages/:user_id/:message_id/read" - the URL pattern (:user_id and :message_id become parameters)
• to: "user_messages#mark_as_read" - the controller and action, separated by #

Note that the controller name should be underscored and without the Controller suffix (e.g., user_messages instead of UserMessagesController).