Best way to render a view from a script-fired http request?

[Ryan Emberling]

Hi guys, I know this is a noob question, but I'm wondering what the best way to render a view from a request made not in the url bar of the browser, but from a js method.

I've got a button in one page that uses angular to make the following request when clicked:

$http({

method: 'GET',

url: 'game/gameView',

data: {

gameId: gameId

}

})

.then(

function success (res) {

console.log("Went to gameView");

console.log(res);

},

function error (res) {

        console.log("Bad request")

}); //End of $http()

On the server I'm handling the request with a res.view()

My problem is that the while the the server is responding to the request with the html, the front end doesn't actually change, because I haven't told it WHAT to do with the html it just received from the server. 

Is there a best practice for handling transitions like this? It feels wrong to just replace the whole page manually with something like:

$(html).html(res.data) //using jquery

But is there any other way? Should I use a different layout than the default, so I can receive less than a full page of html (no head, scripts, etc), and just replace the body in the above way? There is no way to have a request like the one I am making above with angular *directly* navigate me to the page served by res.view(), correct? What do you guys recommend?

Thanks for the help!

[Core E]

You can tell res.view to not use a layout then have your front-end replace the html as needed.

[Ryan Emberling]

Thanks for the quick answer! How do I configure that? Since res.view() only takes 2 parameters (pathToView, locals), I assume this is a global configuration that would disable the use of layouts throughout my application, correct?

[Ryan Emberling]

Ah, found it. It's in config/views.js 

You can set 'layout' to false, and then all layouts are disabled. This does mean that you can't use them elsewhere, so for anyone else stumbling into this: be aware that changing the page with a button necessitates refraining from using layouts!

[Ambroise Dhenain]

I think you can override it somehow using a options object when loading a view, so that this specific view doesn't use a layout.

I'm pretty sure it's possible, look at how the 404/403 are done on the frontend, should give you something to start with.

--

Cordialement,

M. Ambroise Dhenain.