How To Use Angular Routes In a Single-Page Application

Hello everyone! Using AngularJS to develop single-page applications, the concept of routing is important. Maybe you haven’t come across such a term yet or would like to understand what it is and how to use it. In this article, we will look in detail at this concept and how it relates to single-page applications. Routing in AngularJS is very similar to routing in PHP frameworks, so if you are familiar with it, it will be extremely easy for you to understand the concept of how routing works in AngularJS. Let’s begin!

What is Routing in a Web Application?

Routing allows you to create Single Page Application (SPA), i.e. applications that reside entirely on a single page or, more simply, applications that use a single HTML document as the template into which web pages are dynamically loaded. Typically, web applications use readable URLs and describe the content behind them. A typical example would be clicking on a link to the master page: this means that the action will be performed on the server side, then the result will be passed to another view on the client side. We often find ourselves in a similar situation after interacting at the root of a web application (/ or index.html), having noticed changes in the browser address bar. When we make an application, then we naturally want the user to be able to follow different links without refreshing the page and see the information he is interested in, Angular-route is just the toll that will help to do this. One of the key factors of all MVC frameworks is views. And the AngularJS framework is no exception, with the solely distinction that AngularJS approves you to create single-page functions or so-called Single Page Applications when the use of views. Let’s see an example.

For this we will create a new project. For JavaScript files, add a js folder to the project. In this folder, create a new lib directory, into which we put two AngularJS framework files: angular.min.js and angular-route.min.js. The angular-route.min.js file comes with the predominant AngularJS library and it carries the performance of the ngRoute module, which is wanted to supply routing. Now let’s specify the routes for the use of the views. Add the app.js software module definition file to the js folder. To allow the routing functionality, we want to join some other ngRoute module. We use the config approach to outline the routes for the application. The $routeProvider object is used to configure routes. The $routeProvider.when technique takes two parameters: a route title and a route object. The route object defines the view and the controller that handles it the use of the templateUrl and controller parameters. Therefore, for views, we do now not want to outline a controller the usage of a directive. So, we have two routes, and for every route we want to create our personal controller and our personal view. Therefore, in the js folder, we will additionally create any other controllers directory. Let’s add a new file, QuestionController.js, to it. And additionally add any other AnswerController.js file to the js / controllers folder. The first controller, QuestionController, makes use of the dataService to acquire data, so let’s create it. To do this, add a new file dataService.js to the js folder. This provider accesses the question.js file positioned in the root directory. And additionally in the root listing for views, create a views folder. Let’s put the first view in the views folder, which we will name question.html and which will have its personal code. This view will show a query and a listing of responses to it, interacting with the QuestionController. That is, the view does now not want the physique and head tags, solely the markup associated to the view itself. Note that the top-level div component does no longer incorporate the ng-controller = “QuestionController” directive as in the preceding topics. Since we will set the connection with the controller immediately the usage of the route definition. Let the 2nd view incorporate a shape for a response.

Let’s name it answer.html and add our personal code to it too. Since we can specify solely one controller for the view when defining the route for the view, right here it is explicitly indicated the usage of the ng-controller = “QuestionController” directive for the first div block that this block will be processed by means of any other particular controller. Finally, we will outline the foremost net web page index.html at the root of the project.

To navigate thru the views, the nav navigation menu is used right here with hyperlinks like Question . The href attribute right here does now not factor to a particular html page. It factors to the route described earlier. Each route is preceded by means of a # signal so that the browser can, if necessary, get right of entry to this aid directly. After the definition of the menu comes the directive, which is described in the ngRoute module. It represents the place to render the view corresponding to the route. Now, if we run the application, we will be proven a primitive menu. Let’s pick the first object from it, and proper away the software will show the views / question.html view on the index.html page. If you pick any other menu item, a distinct route will work, though we will nevertheless be on the index.html page.
Although the entirety works, when we first get entry to the application, we do now not use any view, and we solely study the menu. But we can restoration this by using specifying a default route. To do this, you want to trade the configuration file of the software module. The $ routeProvider.otherwise technique factors to the default route. In this case, the view views / question.html will be loaded. In this way, the AngularJS framework lets in us to without problems create single-page applications.

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Conclusion

In this article you have read the basic definitions of routing, as well as how to put it into practice. Let’s look at some more details. In AngularJS, you can use the ngRoute module for routing and link service. Here are some important points before applying it:

• to use the ngRoute module, you must include angular-route.js in the application, which obviously needs to be loaded after the angular.js script;
• you must configure the routing that you need inside the module to make it easier to define your module in a separate script.js file;
• you must provide the same name for ng-app (in the HTML file containing the Angular application) and when defining the module.

Remember, that routes are pretty much a way to handle different URL contexts in your website. AngularJS allows you to route your URLs on the client-side with very easy and simple steps. So, now you know how AngularJS routes are working and what you need to do to set up your first (maybe not first) route in a single-page application. Thanks for reading, wish you happy coding!

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