Question

Have done some working samples using Backbone Router, but is there a way to protect the routes being used directly on the address bar? And also when the user press the back button on the browser, the routes doesn’t get cleared and creates issues. What is the best solution for this?

Answer 1

I think I see what you’re saying – you want to force the user to enter your site through a certain (home) page. Is that correct?

This is useful, for example, when you’re building a mobile-optimized-web-app, and you always want users to enter through a splash screen. What I’ll do is set a ‘legitEntrance’ property to my router, and check for it on every route, as so:

APP.Router = Backbone.Router.extend({
 legitEntrance: false,

 // Just a helper function
 setLegitEntrance: function() { 
  this.legitEntrance = true; 
 },

 // Send the user back to the home page
 kickUser: function() {
  this.navigate("home", {trigger:true});
 },

 routes : {
  ...
 },

 // Example router function: Home page
 routeToHome: function() {
  this.setLegitEntrance();
  var homeView = APP.HomeView.extend({ ... });
  homeView.render();
 },

 // Example router function: some other internal page
 routeToSomeOtherInternalPage: function() {
  if(!this.legitEntrance) {
   this.kickUser();
   return;
  }

  var someOtherInternalView = APP.SomeOtherInternalView.extend({ 
   ...
  });

  someOtherInternalView.render();
 }

 ....
});

I’m sure this code could be cleaned up some, but you get the general idea. Hope it helps.