ruby on rails route params in controller

Question

routes.rb:

match 'first/#!/:name' => 'first#first'

first_controller.rb:

class FirstController < ApplicationController
  def first
    @name = params[:name]
  end
end

But the @name variable is nil when I render the url: http://localhost:3000/first/#!/sayuj

Please help

Answer 1

Anything after the first # in the URL is not (usually) sent back to the server; it's used on client side only.

So the URL http://localhost:3000/first/#!/sayuj in the client will actually call the URL http://localhost:3000/first/ on server side.

See the following posts for more info:

• http://code.google.com/web/ajaxcrawling/docs/getting-started.html
• http://www.webmonkey.com/2011/02/gawker-learns-the-hard-way-why-hash-bang-urls-are-evil/
• http://dannythorpe.com/2011/02/09/side-effects-of-hash-bang-urls/
• http://rc3.org/2011/02/09/hash-bang-urls-and-overuse-of-ajax/

Answer 2

Jits is correct that the # in the url will drop the rest of the url, also, I believe your route is incorrect, it should look like:

match 'first/:name', :to => 'first#first'

documentation is at Engine yard rails 3 routes.