Valid sub-routes for the UI app result in 404

[gabalafou]

Should we redirect all unknown routes to the React (UI) app?

When a user goes directly to a React app-defined sub-route (by sub-route I mean any route that is not the root route, "/"), such as "/:namespace/new-environment", the server will return a 404 instead of returning the conda-store-ui.html page.

We should probably redirect all unknown routes to the React (UI) app, conda-store-ui.

That way a user can copy-paste a link like "https://example.com/conda-store/default/new-environment" directly into their browser, as opposed to always having to start from "https://example.com/conda-store". Being able to load non-root routes was the whole point of introducing URL routing into the front end.

[trallard]

Does this mean that to get to let's say namespace/environments right now the user has to go through / then find their way through clicks to namespace/environments?

[gabalafou]

Yes that's exactly the issue

[trallard]

Pffff that sounds awful. So I would be in favour of finding a better way to deal with routes.

[gabalafou]

Exactly. The current configuration defeats the whole point of adding URL routing to the UI app. Part of the argument for getting rid of the tabbed interface was that a user could ctrl- or cmd-click on environments to open them in a new browser tab rather than a new Conda Store UI tab. But if we can't load the UI at URLs like /:namespace/:environment, then that ability to open environments directly in a new tab (or share them with others via URL) does not work.

I believe the usual solution here is to create catch-all or fallback route on the server that serves conda-store-ui.html. Right now, I believe the server is configured to serve that file at one and only one URL: "/" by default, or "/conda-store" in other configurations.

[trallard]

I assigned you @gabalafou and @peytondmurray - I would like you two to figure a solution to this.

[peytondmurray]

For my understanding, when a user pastes https://example.com/conda-store/foo/bar

• currently they get a 404
• under the proposed change, we redirect to https://example.com/conda-store, then window.location gets parsed to take the user to the bar environment in the foo namespace

Is that right?

[gabalafou]

Yes! Except it's not technically a redirect. It's not a 301. It's a 200 and you serve the conda-store-ui.html template at /foo/bar.

[peytondmurray]

Cool, thanks for the clarification - that solution sounds reasonable to me.

@gabalafou Feel free to pick this up as time permits.