routers

This is similar to extensions, but far more powerful.

The Bolt server comes with a number of endpoints (routes) like /api/apps, /api/users, and so on. To make Bolt even more modular and manageable than it already is, the ability to load routes from external apps was added. By doing so, we can move some routes (which are important but not necessarily core) to external apps. That is where the routers object comes in.

routers allows us to load external routes unto the Bolt server. Routers are instances of express.Router(). Some common endpoints which are loaded this way are /api/system, /api/db, /api/events. Any app can register its own routers (and, hence, routes). For instance, to register a router that adds routes that all start with /my/routes:

"routers" : {
    "my-routes": {
        "main": "my-routes.js",
        "root": "/my/routes",
        "order": 1
    }
}

From the snippet above your routers object contains a router called my-routes. main, which in this case is my-routes.js, is a module that exports an instance of express.Router(). The root, which in this case is /my/routes, means every route added by this router must begin with /my/routes; so we could have routes like /my/routes/help and /my/routes/feedback. order is used to sort routers. This is important as other apps may also register routers that begin with /my/routes. When different routers have the same path, requests are directed to the router with a lower order.

If your router has no root (for instance, instead of /my/routes/help and /my/routes/feedback, it registers routes /help and /feedback) and uses default order (0), then you can simple write:

"routers" : {
    "my-routes": "my-routes.js"
}

note

A router will not be loaded if the app that installed the router is not a system app at that point in time.