Router

Question 1

extend

Answer 1

extend

Backbone.Router.extend(properties, [classProperties])

Get started by creating a custom router class. Define actions that are triggered when certain URL fragments are matched, and provide a routes hash that pairs routes to actions. Note that you’ll want to avoid using a leading slash in your route definitions:

var Workspace = Backbone.Router.extend({

routes: {
“help”: “help”, // #help
“search/:query”: “search”, // #search/kiwis
“search/:query/p:page”: “search” // #search/kiwis/p7
},

help: function() {
…
},

search: function(query, page) {
…
}

});

Question 2

routes

Answer 2

routes

router.routes

The routes hash maps URLs with parameters to functions on your router (or just direct function definitions, if you prefer), similar to the View’s events hash. Routes can contain parameter parts, :param, which match a single URL component between slashes; and splat parts *splat, which can match any number of URL components. Part of a route can be made optional by surrounding it in parentheses (/:optional).

For example, a route of “search/:query/p:page” will match a fragment of #search/obama/p2, passing “obama” and “2” to the action.

A route of “file/*path” will match #file/nested/folder/file.txt, passing “nested/folder/file.txt” to the action.

A route of “docs/:section(/:subsection)” will match #docs/faq and #docs/faq/installing, passing “faq” to the action in the first case, and passing “faq” and “installing” to the action in the second.

When the visitor presses the back button, or enters a URL, and a particular route is matched, the name of the action will be fired as an event, so that other objects can listen to the router, and be notified. In the following example, visiting #help/uploading will fire a route:help event from the router.

routes: {
  "help/:page":         "help",
  "download/*path":     "download",
  "folder/:name":       "openFolder",
  "folder/:name-:mode": "openFolder"
}

router.on(“route:help”, function(page) {
…
});

Question 3

constructor / initialize

Answer 3

constructor / initialize
new Router([options])

When creating a new router, you may pass its routes hash directly as an option, if you choose. All options will also be passed to your initialize function, if defined.

Question 4

route

Answer 4

route

router.route(route, name, [callback])

Manually create a route for the router, The route argument may be a routing string or regular expression. Each matching capture from the route or regular expression will be passed as an argument to the callback. The name argument will be triggered as a “route:name” event whenever the route is matched. If the callback argument is omitted router[name] will be used instead.

initialize: function(options) {

  // Matches #page/10, passing "10"
  this.route("page/:number", "page", function(number){ ... });

  // Matches /117-a/b/c/open, passing "117-a/b/c" to this.open
  this.route(/^(.*?)\/open$/, "open");

},

open: function(id) { … }

Question 5

navigate

Answer 5

navigate

router.navigate(fragment, [options])

Whenever you reach a point in your application that you’d like to save as a URL, call navigate in order to update the URL. If you wish to also call the route function, set the trigger option to true. To update the URL without creating an entry in the browser’s history, set the replace option to true.

openPage: function(pageNumber) {
this.document.pages.at(pageNumber).open();
this.navigate(“page/” + pageNumber);
}

Or …

app.navigate(“help/troubleshooting”, {trigger: true});

Or …

app.navigate(“help/troubleshooting”, {trigger: true, replace: true});