Routing and Rendering

Routing-and-Rendering.md

Routing and Rendering

Route Structure

most pages are folder routes:

  • /feed -> feed/index.php + feed/content.html
  • /journal/posts/12 -> journal/posts/index.php
  • /settings -> settings/index.php + settings/content.html

static error pages are the main exception:

  • error/403/index.html
  • error/404/index.html
  • error/50x/index.html
  • error/wip/index.html

Upward File Lookup

most PHP routes define a local find_template_file() helper that walks up parent directories until it finds a requested file.

that means nested routes can still find:

  • template.html
  • template_mobile.html
  • content.html
  • lib/render.php
  • root-level assets or data paths

admin account pages use equivalent helpers in account/admin/helpers.php.

Standard Render Flow

typical route flow:

  1. start session through fridg3_start_session() from lib/session.php
  2. optionally enforce auth/admin checks
  3. load render helper from lib/render.php
  4. choose template with get_preferred_template_name(__DIR__)
  5. load local content.html
  6. inject placeholders like {content}, wiki - routing and rendering, browse the internal developer wiki for fridg3.org.,
  7. optionally swap account footer button to logout when logged in

theme selection also runs through lib/render.php. default is blackprint and uses the base template/style. desktop requests for selectable themes can use a theme HTML template from /themes/lib; mobile requests always keep template_mobile.html and append the selected theme CSS after the mobile inline styles. legacy saved values are normalized (blackprint to default, custom to classic, newsprint to whiteprint).

some routes also pull in extra shared libs like lib/feed.php for route-specific persistence helpers instead of keeping all that logic inline.

Homepage Special Case

root index.php is more dynamic than the wrapper routes.

it injects:

  • latest feed post from data/feed/*.txt
  • latest journal post from data/journal/*.txt
  • up to 3 music cards from data/music/frdg3/*.json

it also contains older bookmark-loading logic that still points at /data/users, which is legacy behavior and worth keeping an eye on.

Wrapper Routes vs Data Routes

wrapper routes are mostly just shell + static content:

  • discord/
  • merch/
  • parts of others/

data-backed routes do real work:

  • feed/
  • journal/
  • guestbook/
  • bookmarks/
  • contact/
  • music/
  • gallery/
  • account/*
  • api/*

WIP / Maintenance Behavior

maintenance mode is driven by data/etc/wip.

main.js:

  • loads the flag
  • shows the maintenance banner
  • redirects non-admins to /error/wip
  • allows /account/login and /error/wip

the admin bypass depends on either:

  • is_admin cookie
  • /api/account/is-admin

Local Dev Mode

lib/render.php treats localhost, 127.x.x.x, 0.0.0.0, ::1, .localhost, .test, or truthy FRIDG3_DEV_MODE as local development. Local renders inject a sidebar dev mode banner beside the maintenance banner.

Page View Counting

page views are not baked in by PHP. the footer view count is hydrated by main.js, which posts the current path to /api/page-view.

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