Question

Scenario
I have a Sinatra App
I have a route that fetches articles based on a certain named path

# Get Articles for a certain time period

get '/frontpage/:type' do  
    case params[:type]

    when "today"
      @news = Article.find(...)
    when "yesterday"
      @news = Article.find(...)
    when "week-ago" 
      @news = Article.find(...)
    when "month-ago" 
      @news = Article.find(...)
      else
        not_found
    end

    erb :frontpage

end

Question
Is it possible to keep this route "/frontpage/:type" and show a .json page if for example someone ask for "/frontpage/:today.json" instead of "/frontpage/:type" ?

OR

Is it better to create a separate route specifically for requests for JSON ?

Answer 1

You will have to create a new route.

Though, you can factor your code like that:

get '/frontpage/:type' do
  @news = get_articles(params[:type])
  erb :frontpage
end

get '/frontpage/:type.json' do
  get_articles(params[:type]).json
end

def get_articles(type)
  case 
  when "today"
    Article.find(...)
  when "yesterday"
    Article.find(...)
  when "week-ago" 
    Article.find(...)
  when "month-ago" 
    Article.find(...)
  else
    raise "Unsupported type #{type}. Supported types are: today, yesterday, week-ago and month-ago."
  end
end