A lot of Remix API isn't imported from remix, but are instead conventions and exports from your application modules.
When remix first starts up, it reads your config file, you need to make sure this file is deployed to your server as it's read when the server starts.
module.exports = {
appDirectory: "app",
browserBuildDirectory: "public/build",
devServerPort: 8002,
publicPath: "/build/",
serverBuildDirectory: "build",
routes(defineRoutes) {
return defineRoute(route => {
route("/somewhere/cool/*", "catchall.tsx");
});
}
};
The path to the app directory, relative to remix.config.js. Defaults to "app".
// default
exports.appDirectory = "./app";
// custom
exports.appDirectory = "./elsewhere";
A function for defining custom routes, in addition to those already defined
using the filesystem convention in app/routes. Both sets of routes will be merged.
exports.routes = async (defineRoutes) => {
// If you need to do async work, do it before calling `defineRoutes`, we use
// the call stack of `route` inside to set nesting.
return defineRoutes((route) => {
// A common use for this is catchall routes.
// - The first argument is the React Router path to match against
// - The second is the relative filename of the route handler
route("/some/path/*", "catchall.tsx")
// if you want to nest routes, use the optional callback argument
route("some/:path", "some/route/file.js", () => {
// - path is relative to parent path
// - filenames are still relative to the app directory
route("relative/path", "some/other/file")
});
}
}
The path to the browser build, relative to remix.config.js. Defaults to "public/build". Should be deployed to static hosting.
The URL prefix of the browser build with a trailing slash. Defaults to "/build/". This is the path the browser will use to find assets.
The path to the server build, relative to remix.config.js. Defaults to "build". This needs to be deployed to your server.
The port number to use for the dev server. Defaults to 8002.
Options to use when compiling MDX.
exports.mdx = {
rehypePlugins: [require("@mapbox/rehype-prism"), require("rehype-slug")]
};
There are a few conventions that Remix uses you should be aware of.
remix.config.js: Remix uses this file to know how to build your app for production and run it in development. This file is required.app/entry.server.{js,tsx}: This is your entry into the server rendering piece of Remix. This file is required.app/entry.client.{js,tsx}: This is your entry into the browser rendering/hydration piece of Remix. This file is required.app/root.tsx: This is your root layout, or "root route" (very sorry for those of you who pronounce those words the same way!). It works just like all other routes: you can export a loader, action, etc.
app/routes/*.{js,jsx,tsx,md,mdx}: Any files in the app/routes/ directory will become routes in your application. Remix supports all of those extensions.
app/routes/{folder}/*.js: Folders inside of routes will create nested URLs.
app/routes/{folder} with app/routes/{folder}.js: When a route has the same name as a folder, it becomes a "layout route" for the child routes inside the folder. Render an <Outlet /> and the child routes will appear there. This is how you can have multiple levels of persistent layout nesting associated with URLs.
Dots in route filesnames: Adding a . in a route file will create a nested URL, but not a nested layout. Flat files are flat layouts, nested files are nested layouts. The . allows you to create nested URLs without needing to create a bunch of layouts. For example: routes/some.long.url.tsx will create the URL /some/long/url.
app/routes/index.js: Routes named "index" will render when the parent layout route's path is matched exactly.
$param: The dollar sign denotes a dynamic segment of the URL. It will be parsed and passed to your loaders and routes.
For example: routes/users/$userId.tsx will match the following URLs: users/123 and users/abc but not users/123/abc because that has too many segments. See the routing guide for more information.
Some CLIs require you to escape the $ when creating files:
touch routes/\$params.tsx
Params can be nested routes, just create a folder with the $ in it.
routes/404.tsx: When a URL can't be matched to a route, Remix uses this file to render a 404 page. We don't like this convention because "/404" should be a valid URL (maybe you're showing the best BBQ in Atlanta!). This is what we've got right now though. This will probably.
Remix uses app/entry.client.js as the entry point for the browser bundle. This module gives you full control over the "hydrate" step after JavaScript loads into the document.
Typically this module uses ReactDOM.hydrate to re-hydrate the markup that was already generated on the server in your server entry module.
Here's a basic example:
import ReactDOM from "react-dom";
import Remix from "@remix-run/react/browser";
ReactDOM.hydrate(<Remix />, document);
As you can see, you have full control over hydration. This is the first piece of code that runs in the browser. As you can see, you have full control here. You can initialize client side libraries, setup thing likes window.history.scrollRestoration, etc.
Remix uses app/entry.server.js to generate the HTTP response when rendering on the server. The default export of this module is a function that lets you create the response, including HTTP status, headers, and HTML, giving you full control over the way the markup is generated and sent to the client.
This module should render the markup for the current page using a <Remix> element with the context and url for the current request. This markup will (optionally) be re-hydrated once JavaScript loads in the browser using the browser entry module.
Here's a basic example:
import ReactDOMServer from "react-dom/server";
import type { EntryContext } from "remix";
import { RemixServer } from "remix";
export default function handleRequest(
request: Request,
responseStatusCode: number,
responseHeaders: Headers,
remixContext: EntryContext
) {
let markup = ReactDOMServer.renderToString(
<RemixServer context={remixContext} url={request.url} />
);
responseHeaders.set("Content-Type", "text/html");
return new Response("<!DOCTYPE html>" + markup, {
status: responseStatusCode,
headers: responseHeaders
});
}
A route in Remix is mostly a React component, with a couple extra exports.
It's important to read Route Module Constraints.
The only required export of a route module is a React component. When the URL matches, the component will be rendered.
export default function SomeRouteComponent() {
return (
<div>
<h1>Look ma!</h1>
<p>I'm still using React after like 7 years.</p>
</div>
);
}
Each route can define a loader function that will be called before rendering to provide data to the route.
export let loader = () => {
return fetch("https://example.com/api/stuff");
};
This function is only ever run on the server. On the initial server render it will be called and provide data to the HTML document. On navigations in the browser, Remix will call the function via fetch. This means you can talk directly to your database, use server only API secrets, etc. Any code that isn't used to render the UI will be removed from the browser bundle.
Using the database ORM Prisma as an example:
import { prisma } from "../db";
export let loader = () => {
return await prisma.user.findMany();
};
export default function Users() {
let data = useRouteData();
return (
<ul>
{data.map(user => (
<li>{user.name}</li>
))}
</ul>
);
}
Because prisma is only used in the loader it will be removed from the browser bundle.
Route params are passed to your loader. If you have a loader at data/invoices/$invoiceId.js then Remix will parse out the invoiceId and pass it to your loader. This is useful for fetching data from an API or database.
// if the user visits /invoices/123
export let loader: Loader = ({ params }) => {
params.invoiceId; // "123"
};
This is a Web API Request instance with information about the request. You can read the MDN docs to see all of it's properties.
You can also use this to read URL URLSearchParams from the request like so:
// say the user is at /some/route?foo=bar
export let loader: Loader = ({ request }) => {
let url = new URL(request.url);
let foo = url.searchParams.get("foo");
};
This is the context you passed in to your deployment wrapper's getLoaderContext() function. It's a way to bridge the gap between the platform's request/response API with your remix app.
Say your express server (or your serverless function handler) looks something like this:
const { createRequestHandler } = require("@remix-run/express");
app.all(
"*",
createRequestHandler({
getLoaderContext(req, res) {
// this becomes the loader context
return { req, res };
}
})
);
And then your loader can access it.
// data/some-loader.js
export let loader: Loader = ({ context }) => {
let { req } = context.req;
// read a cookie
req.cookies.session;
};
You can return plain JavaScript objects from your loaders that will be made available to your route modules.
// some fake database, not part of remix
let db = require("../db");
export let loader = async () => {
let users = await db.query("users");
return users;
};
You can return Web API Response objects from your loaders. Here's a pretty basic JSON response:
// some fake database, not part of remix
import db from "../db";
export let loader: Loader = async () => {
let users = await db.query("users");
let body = JSON.stringify(users);
return new Response(body, {
headers: {
"Content-Type": "application/json"
}
});
};
Normally you'd use the json helper from your environment.
import db from "../db";
import { json } from "remix";
export let loader: Loader = async () => {
let users = await db.query("users");
return json(users);
};
Between these two examples you can see how json just does a little of work to make your loader a lot cleaner.
See also:
Loaders can return Responses with status codes. This is very useful for "not found" data making it's way all the way down to the browser's UI with a real 404 status code, 500s, etc.
import { json } from "remix";
export let loader = async () => {
let res = db.query("users").where("id", "=", "_why");
if (res === null) {
return json({ notFound: true }, { status: 404 });
} else {
return res;
}
};
This is also useful for 500 error handling. You don't need to render a different page, instead, handle the error, send the data, and send a 500 response to the app.
export let loader: Loader = async () => {
try {
let stuff = await something();
return json(stuff);
} catch (error) {
return json(
{
error: true,
message: error.message
},
{ status: 500 }
);
}
};
Now your route component can deal with it:
export default function Something() {
let data = useRouteData();
if (data.error) {
return <ErrorMessage>{data.message}</ErrorMessage>;
}
// ...
}
The initial server render will get a 500 for this page, and client side transitions will get it also.
Like loader, action is a server only function to handle data mutations and other actions. If a non-GET request is made to your route (POST, PUT, PATCH, DELETE) then the route's action is called instead of its loader.
Actions are triggered from <form method="post"> or Remix <Form method="post | put | patch | delete" /> submits. Note you must always return a redirect (we do this so users can't click "back" and accidentally resubmit the form).
import { redirect } from "remix";
import { PrismaClient } from "@prisma/client";
let prisma = new PrismaClient();
export let action = async ({ params, request }) => {
let data = new URLSearchParams(await request.text());
let update = await prisma.post.update({
where: { id: params.postId },
data: Object.fromEntries(data)
});
return `/posts/${params.postId}`;
};
You must return a redirect of some sort, there are three, depending on your needs:
export let action = async () => {
// you can return a string
return `/posts/${params.postId}`;
// or use the redirect helper, useful when committing sessions
return redirect(`/posts/${params.postId}`, {
headers: {
"Set-Cookie": await commitSession()
}
});
// or if you want to get really low level, construct your own response
return new Response("", {
status: 303,
headers: {
Location: "/somewhere"
}
});
};
Each route can define it's own HTTP headers. One of the most important headers is the Cache-Control header that indicates to browser and CDN caches where and for how long a page is able to be cached.
export function headers({ loaderHeaders, parentHeaders }) {
return {
"X-Stretchy-Pants": "its for fun",
"Cache-Control": "max-age=300, s-maxage=3600"
};
}
Usually your data is a better indicator of your cache duration than your route module (data tends to be more dynamic than markup), so the loader's headers are passed in to headers() too:
export function headers({ loaderHeaders }) {
return {
"Cache-Control": loaderHeaders.get("Cache-Control")
};
}
Note: loaderHeaders is an instance of the Web Fetch API Headers class.
Because Remix has nested routes, there's a battle of the headers to be won when nested routes match. In this case, the deepest route wins. Consider these files in the routes directory:
├── users.js
└── users
├── $userId.js
└── $userId
└── profile.js
If we are looking at /users/123/profile then three routes are rendering:
<Users>
<UserId>
<Profile />
</UserId>
</Users>
If all three define headers, the deepest module wins, in this case profile.js.
We don't want surprise headers in your responses, so it's your job to merge them if you'd like. Remix passes in the parentHeaders to your headers function. So users.js headers get passed to $userId.js, and then $userId.js headers are passed to profile.js headers.
That is all to say that Remix has given you a very large gun with which to shoot your foot. You need to be careful not to send a Cache-Control from a child route module that is more aggressive than a parent route. Here's some code that picks the least aggressive caching in these cases:
import parseCacheControl from "parse-cache-control";
export function headers({ loaderHeaders, parentHeaders }) {
let loaderCache = parseCacheControl(loaderHeaders.get("Cache-Control"));
let parentCache = parseCacheControl(parentHeaders.get("Cache-Control"));
// take the most conservative between the parent and loader, otherwise
// we'll be too aggressive for one of them.
let maxAge = Math.min(loaderCache["max-age"], parentCache["max-age"]);
return {
"Cache-Control": `max-age=${maxAge}`
};
}
All that said, you can avoid this entire problem by not defining headers in layout routes and only in leaf routes. Every layout that can be visited directly will likely have an "index route". If you only define headers on your leaf routes, not your layout routes, you will never have to worry about merging headers.
The meta export will set meta tags for your html document. We highly recommend setting the title and description on every route besides layout routes (their index route will set the meta).
import type { MetaFunction } from "remix";
export let meta: MetaFunction = () => {
return {
title: "Something cool",
description: "This becomes the nice preview on search results."
};
};
Title is a special case and will render a <title> tag, the rest render <meta name={key} content={value}/>.
In the case of nested routes, the meta tags are merged, so parent routes can add meta tags with the child routes needing to copy them.
The links function defines which <link> elements to add to the page when the user visits a page.
import type { LinksFunction } from "remix";
import { block } from "remix";
export let links: LinksFunction = () => {
return [
{ rel: "icon", href: "/favicon.png", type: "image/png" },
{ rel: "stylesheet", href: "https://example.com/some/styles.css" },
{ page: "/users/123" },
block({ rel: "preload", href: "/images/banner.jpg", as: "image" })
];
};
There are three types of link descriptors you can return:
This is an object representation of a normal <link {...props} /> element. View the MDN docs for the link API.
Examples:
import type { LinksFunction } from "remix";
import { block } from "remix";
import stylesHref from "../styles/something.css";
export let links: LinksFunction = () => {
return [
// add a favicon
{ rel: "icon", href: "/favicon.png", type: "image/png" },
// add an external stylesheet
{
rel: "stylesheet",
href: "https://example.com/some/styles.css",
crossOrigin: "true"
},
// add a local stylesheet, remix will fingerprint the file name for
// production caching
{ rel: "stylesheet", href: stylesHref },
// prefetch an image into the browser cache that the user is likely to see
// as they interact with this page, perhaps they click a button to reveal in
// a summary/details element
{ rel: "prefetch", as: "image", href: "/img/bunny.jpg" },
// only prefetch it if they're on a bigger screen
{
rel: "prefetch",
as: "image",
href: "/img/bunny.jpg",
media: "(min-width: 1000px)"
}
];
};
You can block { rel: "preload" } HTMLLinkDescriptors on client side page transitions by wrapping them in block(descriptor).
import type { LinksFunction } from "remix";
import { block } from "remix";
export let links: LinksFunction = () => {
return [
block({
rel: "preload",
as: "image",
href: "/img/bunny.jpg"
})
];
};
When the user clicks a link to this page, the transition will not complete until the image has loaded into the browser cache. This can help prevent layout shift as the user navigates around.
Note: The image will not be fully loaded if the user's initial visit to the website is this page. There's no way for Remix to do that.
Be careful with this API: Waiting on images or other assets will drastically slow down the transition from one route to another. Use this feature with discretion.
These descriptors allow you to prefetch the resources for a page the user is likely to navigate to. What do we mean by likely? Some examples:
Let's take the login → dashboard example:
import type { LinksFunction } from "remix";
export let links: LinksFunction = () => {
return [{ page: "/dashboard" }];
};
You can prefetch the data for the next page with the data boolean:
{ page: "/users/123", data: true }
Be careful with this feature. You don't want to download 10MB of JavaScript and data for pages the user probably won't ever visit.
An ErrorBoundary is a React component that renders whenever there is an error anywhere on the route, either during rendering or during data loading.
Note: We use the word "error" to mean an uncaught exception; something you didn't anticipate happening. This is different from other types of "errors" that you are able to recover from easily, for example a 404 error where you can still show something in the user interface to indicate you weren't able to find some data.
A Remix ErrorBoundary component works just like normal React error boundaries, but with a few extra capabilities. When there is an error in your route component, the ErrorBoundary will be rendered in its place, nested inside any parent routes. ErrorBoundary components also render when there is an error in the loader or action functions for a route, so all errors for that route may be handled in one spot.
An ErrorBoundary component receives one prop: the error that occurred.
export function ErrorBoundary({ error }) {
return (
<div>
<h1>Error</h1>
<p>{error.message}</p>
<p>The stack trace is:</p>
<pre>{error.stack}</pre>
</div>
);
}
Exporting a handle allows you to create application conventions with the useMatches() hook. You can put whatever values you want on it:
export let handle = {
its: "all yours"
};
This is almost always used on conjunction with useMatches. To see what kinds of things you can do with it, refer to useMatches for more information.
Any files inside the app folder can be imported into your modules. Remix will:
It's most common for stylesheets, but can used for anything.
// root.tsx
import type { LinksFunction } from "remix";
import styles from "./styles/app.css";
import banner from "./images/banner.jpg";
export let links: LinksFunction = () => {
return [{ rel: "stylesheet", href: styles }];
};
export default function Page() {
return (
<div>
<h1>Some Page</h1>
<img src={banner} />
</div>
);
}
