Routing: An Overview

URLs should be clean. Code should be simple. Trongate delivers both - no config files, no YAML, no Route::get() ceremonies.

Old-school PHP:

Trongate:

That’s it. No question marks. No cat-on-keyboard URLs. Just URLs that humans trust and Google rewards.

Three Types of Routing

Trongate offers the following three types of routing, all of which will be covered in this chapter:

Type	What Happens	Ceremony Required
Homepage	Hit root → `welcome` module loads automatically	None
Automatic	`/users/profile/88` → `Users->profile(88)`	None
Custom	You define the rule in one line of PHP	One line

These three concepts often get mixed up. Let's settle it, once and for all. Here’s the definitive, no-BS breakdown:

At a glance:

What it does: Tells Trongate which controller/method to run.

Where: config/custom_routing.php or via automatic URL routing

Address bar changes? No.

Example:

/blog/old-slug → Posts->show(123)

Think of it like this: Routing changes what loads, not the address bar.

What it does: Secretly funnels all requests to index.php so pretty URLs work.

Where: .htaccess (Apache) or Nginx config.

Address bar changes? No.

Example (Apache):

Think of it like this: Rewriting is a backstage pass that sneaks every URL into index.php.

What it does: Tells the browser “go somewhere else”.

Where: Server sends response → browser navigates to another URL.

Address bar changes? Yes.

Example:

/old-page → /new-page

Trongate helper example:

NOTE: redirect() is a helper function that's built into Trongate. Use it to perform an HTTP redirect.

Think of it like this: Redirecting says, “Wrong door, mate. Try next door.” User sees the new URL.

Never forget:

PS – You forgot already, didn’t you?