URI- and method-based handlers

[emiln]

Handler improvements

Choosing the appropriate handler for a request currently amounts to picking the first one in the handler set. Similarly, adding a new handler is a matter of supplying a single function, taking the request as parameter. Both will need to be changed in order to accomodate URI- and method-based matching.

Current usage:

(add-handler
  (fn [request] "Quality HTML"))

This clearly does not allow matching any URI or method (:post, :get, etc.)

Suggested usage:

(defhandler
  my-handler-name
  "/my/uri" :get
  [request context]
  "Body as a function of request and context.")

Open questions

A few questions remain, however:

• How are wildcards handled in URIs?
• How are matched wildcards presented to the handler?
• How are several URI matches treated (fitness of a handler)?
• How are handlers with identical URI and method dealt with?

[emiln]

A few examples of code I'd like to write when using Tidbytes:

(defhandler
  "/user/view/:name" :*
  (fn [request context]
    (format "Currently viewing the profile of %s." (:name context))))

and

(defhandler
  "/user/profile/:id"
  {:get
   (fn [request context]
     (show-user :id)),
   :delete
   (fn [request context]
     (delete-user :id))})

and perhaps even

(defhandler
  (with-prefix "/user/by-id/:id"
    {:get
     {"/achievements"
      (fn [request context]
        (format "Showing achievements for %s:" (:id context))),
      "/friends"
      (fn [request context]
        (format "Showing friends for %s;" (:id context)))}}))