Backbone.js maintains routing information in a URL after the hash mark, e.g.:
http://localhost:3000#page/hardware/table/?action=details&actionTargetId=5&actionTargetName=10.3.177.185&actionTarget=host
Even though the routing information is in the format ?p1=v1&p2=v2&p3=v3, this portion is not technically part of the url query string since it comes after the hash mark.
My question is if I add an actual query string to our app's urls like this:
http://localhost:3000?newparam=newvalue#page/hardware/table/?action=details&actionTargetId=5&actionTargetName=10.3.177.185&actionTarget=host
is there any possibility of the "newparam" url parameter interfering with the backbone portion?
the problem is your not actually creating a legit query string. your mixing your route with your parameters.
your example is formatted as:
domain ? param # route ? other params
as soon as a questionmark appears in a url everything after it is interpreted as a query string. (in this case) even your route.
personally i suggest using the html5 pushstate.
Backbone.history.start({pushState: true})
this will give you clean(er) urls
http://localhost:3000/page/hardware/table/?newparam=newvalue&action=details&actionTargetId=5&actionTargetName=10.3.177.185&actionTarget=host
that will help your routes to not interfere with your parameters.
Related
I came across an unusual URL structure on a site. It looked like this:
https://www.agilealliance.org/glossary/xp/#q=~(infinite~false~filters~(postType~(~'post~'aa_book~'aa_event_session~'aa_experience_report)~tags~(~'xp))~searchTerm~'~sort~false~sortDirection~'asc~page~1)
It seems the category, pagination and sort options of a widget on the page injects and reads through these values. Does this format for storing data in the URL have a name, or is this an esoteric format someone made?
What's the purpose of doing this over using regular GET params, or at least using a more conventional format after the fragment?
If you inspect the URL carefully, you'll see that the parameters you describe are placed after the fragment (#), meaning they're not sent to the server but used by the client instead.
In this case, the client (JavaScript) builds them into something like an ElasticSearch query that's then POSTed to the server, in order to update listing you see on your screen.
Here is the thing:
Let's say I have a base URL like this:
www.mysite.com?my_first_param=1&my_second_param=2
But now I want to add a new parameter to my URL:
www.mysite.com?my_first_param=1&my_second_param=2&my_redirect_site=www.myothersite.com
Imagine that I am using a service where they add new tracking parameters to my URL. For example:
first_tracking=value1&second_value=value2
Since my BASE url already has a "?" the parameters are added with a "&", so my final URL would look like this:
www.mysite.com?my_first_param=1&my_second_param=2&my_redirect_site=www.myothersite.com&first_tracking=value1&second_value=value2
This is a correct URL with several parameters, but when I do the redirect to www.myothersite.com, since the parameters start with a "&", they get lost. Would it be correct to add the tracking parameters with a starting "?" ? Like this:
www.mysite.com?my_first_param=1&my_second_param=2&my_redirect_site=www.myothersite.com?first_tracking=value1&second_value=value2
If not, what would be a good approach for dealing with this? I believe is responsibility of the redirect to pass through the tracking parameters to the redirect URL.
You should URLencode each param name and value properly, so if the map of params you want is this:
my_first_param => 1
my_second_param => 2
my_redirect_site => www.myothersite.com?first_tracking=value1&second_value=value2
then you should pass this as the query string:
?my_first_param=1&my_second_param=2&my_redirect_site=www.myothersite.com%3Ffirst_tracking%3Dvalue1%26second_value%3Dvalue2
You should be using a library which does this already to build up URIs to handle this encoding for you.
No, you can't have a second question mark in a URL.
Furthermore, if you have ampersands in the redirect URL, they will be seen as separate parameters for the main URL, and not seen as connected to the redirect URL.
If you want to do a redirect like this, you need to URLEncode the whole of the redirected URL. There are standard functions in most web-facing languages to do this.
Encode the parameter, "?" would be replaced by %3F
It depends on the amount of control you have over the service adding the tracking parameters.
Can you change the url after the parameters have been added?
If you can, then you should use a url builder to add the tracking parameters to your redirect url, then url encode that url entriely, tracking parameters included.
If you are not in control and a third party modifies your url, then you will have to do this when you redirect, read the parameters in the url, take your redirect url and the tracking parameters, add the tracking parameters to the redirect url before redirect.
I want to call a JSP with GET parameters within the GET parameter of a parent JSP. The URL for this would be http://server/getMap.jsp?lat=30&lon=-90&name=http://server/getName.jsp?lat1=30&lon1=-90
getName.jsp will return a string that goes in the name parameter of getMap.jsp.
I think the problem here is that &lon1=-90 at the end of the URL will be given to getMap.jsp instead of getName.jsp. Is there a way to distinguish which GET parameter goes to which URL?
One idea I had was to encode the second URL (e.g. = -> %3D and & -> %26) but that didn't work out well. My best idea so far is to allow only one parameter in the second URL, comma-delimited. So I'll have http://server/getMap.jsp?lat=30&lon=-90&name=http://server/getName.jsp?params=30,-90 and leave it up to getName.jsp to parse its variables. This way I leave the & alone.
NOTE - I know I can approach this problem from a completely different angle and avoid nested URLs altogether, but I still wonder (for the sake of knowledge!) if this is possible or if anyone has done it...
This has been done a lot, especially with ad serving technologies and URL redirects
But an encoded URL should just work fine. You need to completely encode it tho. A generator can be found here
So this:
http://server/getMap.jsp?lat=30&lon=-90&name=http://server/getName.jsp?lat1=30&lon1=-90
becomes this: http://server/getMap.jsp?lat=30&lon=-90&name=http%3A%2F%2Fserver%2FgetName.jsp%3Flat1%3D30%26lon1%3D-90
I am sure that jsp has a function for this. Look for "urlencode". Your JSP will see the contents of the GET-Variable "name" as the unencoded string: "http://server/getName.jsp?lat1=30&lon1=-90"
I have an MVC3 Action that takes a parameter (a URL) that may have a query string in it. My action signature looks like this:
GetUrl(string url)
I expect to be able to send it urls, and it works every time unless there is a query string in the url. For example, if I navigate to:
MyController/GetUrl/www.google.com
the url parameter comes accross as "www.google.com" -Perfect. However, if I send
MyController/GetUrl/www.google.com/?id=3
the url parameter comes accross as "www.google.com/" How do I get MVC3 to give me the whole URL in that parameter? -Including the query string?
It's simple enough to just URL.Encode the passed in URL on the page but you're opening your self to some possible security problems.
I would suggest you encrypt the url then encode it then pass that as your value, the protects you from having people just passing in anything into your app.
That's because system considers id=3 as its own query string. When you construct the link in the view, you need to use #Url.Encode to convert raw url string to encoded string to be accepted as parameter of the controller.
For example:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/698627/ms-access-properties
The number is part of the URL but is an argument to the web app as opposed to other options like:
http://www.google.com/firefox?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official
where all the args come after the '?'. I have used the second form before and I'm only trying to learn about the first form.
I'm sure I can find what else I need once I known what that's called so I can Google it.
URL Rewriting, generally.
Edit: Here is a good introduction to URL Rewriting.
Variables passed in the form of a URL are called the Query String. In a url like:
http://examples.com?a=b&c=d&e=f
The query string is ?a=b&c=d&e=f
In the Stackoverflow example, it uses URL Rewriting, specifically with MVC Routing to make 'pretty URLs'. There are other ways to do it in other languages. Some make use of Apache's mod_rewrite (example) while others parse the requested URI. In PHP a url like
http://example.com/index.php/test/path/info
can be parsed by reading $_SERVER['PATH_INFO'] which is /text/path/info.
Generally, they are using URL Rewriting to simulate the query string however. In the Stackoverflow example:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/698711/what-is-the-name-for-that-thing-that-lets-part-of-the-url-be-an-argument
The important parts are the questions/698711. You can change the title of the question with impunity but the other two parts you cannot.
It's usually called the 'path info'.
That's just URL mapping. It lets you use pretty URLs instead of a large query string.
I believe the StackOverflow URL works that way because it is using MVC whereas your bottom example is using standard requests.
It is indeed done by URL rewriting.
Usually, web application frameworks do this automatically if you install it correctly on your server.
Check out CakePHP as an example.
It's called a URL parameter and uses the HTTP GET method. As others mentioned, it can be rewritten using URL rewriting so that the URL is easier to read and use. Some search keywords: "SEF URLs", "Apache Rewrite", "pretty URLs".