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Router
======
The router is used to match incoming requests to request handler
functions. Typically users don't interact with the router directly,
but instead send a list of routes to register when starting the
server. However it is also possible to add routes after starting the
server by calling the `register` method on the server's `router`
property.
Routes are represented by a three item tuple::
(methods, path_match, handler)
`methods` is either a string or a list of strings indicating the HTTP
methods to match. In cases where all methods should match there is a
special sentinel value `any_method` provided as a property of the
`router` module that can be used.
`path_match` is an expression that will be evaluated against the
request path to decide if the handler should match. These expressions
follow a custom syntax intended to make matching URLs straightforward
and, in particular, to be easier to use than raw regexp for URL
matching. There are three possible components of a match expression:
* Literals. These match any character. The special characters \*, \{
and \} must be escaped by prefixing them with a \\.
* Match groups. These match any character other than / and save the
result as a named group. They are delimited by curly braces; for
example::
{abc}
would create a match group with the name `abc`.
* Stars. These are denoted with a `*` and match any character
including /. There can be at most one star
per pattern and it must follow any match groups.
Path expressions always match the entire request path and a leading /
in the expression is implied even if it is not explicitly
provided. This means that `/foo` and `foo` are equivalent.
For example, the following pattern matches all requests for resources with the
extension `.py`::
*.py
The following expression matches anything directly under `/resources`
with a `.html` extension, and places the "filename" in the `name`
group::
/resources/{name}.html
The groups, including anything that matches a `*` are available in the
request object through the `route_match` property. This is a
dictionary mapping the group names, and any match for `*` to the
matching part of the route. For example, given a route::
/api/{sub_api}/*
and the request path `/api/test/html/test.html`, `route_match` would
be::
{"sub_api": "html", "*": "html/test.html"}
`handler` is a function taking a request and a response object that is
responsible for constructing the response to the HTTP request. See
:doc:`handlers` for more details on handler functions.
.. _router.Interface:
:mod:`Interface <wptserve.router>`
----------------------------------
.. automodule:: wptserve.router
:members: