Question

This seems to me like a pretty basic question, but I haven’t been able to find an answer.

I’m using express with ejs as template engine and the following dir structure:

 |-static
 |---css
 |---img
 |---js
 |-views

I have static routing defined for static folder:

app.configure(function(){
        app.set('views', __dirname + '/views');
        app.set('view engine', 'ejs');
        app.use(express.bodyParser());
        app.use(partials());
        app.use(express.methodOverride());
        app.use(express.static(__dirname + '/static'));
        app.use(app.router);
        app.enable("jsonp callback");
    });

In Views folder i keep all of my ejs files – one layout.ejs and the rest are files with the actual content of the specific page.

I’ve defined the following routes:

app.get('/', function(req,res){
    locals.date = new Date().toLocaleDateString();
    res.render('home.ejs', locals);
});

app.get('/about', function(req,res){
    locals.date = new Date().toLocaleDateString();
    res.render('about.ejs', locals);
});
app.get('/contact', function(req,res){
    locals.date = new Date().toLocaleDateString();
    res.render('contact.ejs', locals);
});

which takes layout.ejs and renders it with the page together.

Obviously I don’t want to add a new route each time I add a new page, I want it to be done automatically.

So I am guessing it should have to do with defining another app.use(express.static(__dirname + '/views')); ? also I don’t want the url to show /about.ejs but to show /about

Can someone please point me in the right direction ?

Thanks !

Answer 1

You can write your own routing logic, for example

function customRouter (req, res, next)
{
    var locals = {};
    var controllerName = req.params.controllerName;
    res.render(controllerName + '.ejs', locals);
}

app.get('/:controllerName', customRouter);

This is a simple example however it should give you the trick. You can modify it according to your own needs.