14 KiB
Build a Banking App Part 1: HTML Templates and Routes in a Web App
Pre-Lecture Quiz
Introduction
Since JavaScript was introduced in browsers, websites have become more interactive and complex than ever. Web technologies are now often used to create fully functional applications that run directly in a browser, known as web applications. Because web apps are highly interactive, users don't want to wait for a full page reload every time they perform an action. This is why JavaScript is used to update the HTML directly via the DOM, providing a smoother user experience.
In this lesson, we’ll lay the groundwork for creating a banking web app. We’ll use HTML templates to create multiple screens that can be displayed and updated without reloading the entire HTML page.
Prerequisite
You’ll need a local web server to test the web app we’ll build in this lesson. If you don’t have one, you can install Node.js and use the command npx lite-server from your project folder. This will create a local web server and open your app in a browser.
Preparation
On your computer, create a folder named bank with a file named index.html inside it. We’ll start with this HTML boilerplate:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
<title>Bank App</title>
</head>
<body>
<!-- This is where you'll work -->
</body>
</html>
HTML templates
If you want to create multiple screens for a web page, one solution is to create a separate HTML file for each screen you want to display. However, this approach has some drawbacks:
- The entire HTML has to reload when switching screens, which can be slow.
- Sharing data between different screens becomes difficult.
An alternative approach is to use a single HTML file and define multiple HTML templates using the <template> element. A template is a reusable block of HTML that isn’t displayed by the browser until it’s instantiated at runtime using JavaScript.
Task
We’ll create a banking app with two screens: the login page and the dashboard. First, let’s add a placeholder element in the HTML body that we’ll use to display the different screens of our app:
<div id="app">Loading...</div>
We’ve given it an id to make it easier to locate with JavaScript later.
Tip: Since the content of this element will be replaced, you can add a loading message or indicator that will be shown while the app is loading.
Next, let’s add an HTML template for the login page below. For now, we’ll include only a title and a section containing a link for navigation.
<template id="login">
<h1>Bank App</h1>
<section>
<a href="/dashboard">Login</a>
</section>
</template>
Then, we’ll add another HTML template for the dashboard page. This page will include several sections:
- A header with a title and a logout link
- The current balance of the bank account
- A list of transactions displayed in a table
<template id="dashboard">
<header>
<h1>Bank App</h1>
<a href="/login">Logout</a>
</header>
<section>
Balance: 100$
</section>
<section>
<h2>Transactions</h2>
<table>
<thead>
<tr>
<th>Date</th>
<th>Object</th>
<th>Amount</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody></tbody>
</table>
</section>
</template>
Tip: When creating HTML templates, if you want to preview how they’ll look, you can comment out the
<template>and</template>lines by enclosing them with<!-- -->.
✅ Why do you think we use id attributes on the templates? Could we use something else, like classes?
Displaying templates with JavaScript
If you try opening your current HTML file in a browser, you’ll see it gets stuck displaying Loading.... That’s because we need to add JavaScript code to instantiate and display the HTML templates.
Instantiating a template usually involves three steps:
- Retrieve the template element from the DOM, for example using
document.getElementById. - Clone the template element using
cloneNode. - Attach it to the DOM under a visible element, for example using
appendChild.
✅ Why do we need to clone the template before attaching it to the DOM? What do you think would happen if we skipped this step?
Task
Create a new file named app.js in your project folder and import it in the <head> section of your HTML:
<script src="app.js" defer></script>
Now, in app.js, we’ll create a new function called updateRoute:
function updateRoute(templateId) {
const template = document.getElementById(templateId);
const view = template.content.cloneNode(true);
const app = document.getElementById('app');
app.innerHTML = '';
app.appendChild(view);
}
Here, we follow the three steps described above. We instantiate the template with the id templateId and place its cloned content inside our app placeholder. Note that we use cloneNode(true) to copy the entire subtree of the template.
Now call this function with one of the templates and observe the result.
updateRoute('login');
✅ What’s the purpose of this code app.innerHTML = '';? What happens if we don’t include it?
Creating routes
In the context of a web app, Routing refers to mapping URLs to specific screens that should be displayed. On a website with multiple HTML files, this happens automatically because the file paths are reflected in the URL. For example, with these files in your project folder:
mywebsite/index.html
mywebsite/login.html
mywebsite/admin/index.html
If you create a web server with mywebsite as the root, the URL mapping will be:
https://site.com --> mywebsite/index.html
https://site.com/login.html --> mywebsite/login.html
https://site.com/admin/ --> mywebsite/admin/index.html
However, since our web app uses a single HTML file containing all the screens, this default behavior won’t work. We need to create this mapping manually and update the displayed template using JavaScript.
Task
We’ll use a simple object to implement a map between URL paths and our templates. Add this object at the top of your app.js file:
const routes = {
'/login': { templateId: 'login' },
'/dashboard': { templateId: 'dashboard' },
};
Now let’s modify the updateRoute function slightly. Instead of passing the templateId directly as an argument, we’ll retrieve it by first checking the current URL and then using our map to get the corresponding template ID. We can use window.location.pathname to get just the path section of the URL.
function updateRoute() {
const path = window.location.pathname;
const route = routes[path];
const template = document.getElementById(route.templateId);
const view = template.content.cloneNode(true);
const app = document.getElementById('app');
app.innerHTML = '';
app.appendChild(view);
}
Here, we map the routes we declared to their corresponding templates. You can test this by manually changing the URL in your browser.
✅ What happens if you enter an unknown path in the URL? How could we fix this?
Adding navigation
The next step for our app is to enable navigation between pages without manually changing the URL. This involves two things:
- Updating the current URL
- Updating the displayed template based on the new URL
We’ve already handled the second part with the updateRoute function, so now we need to figure out how to update the current URL.
We’ll use JavaScript, specifically the history.pushState method, which allows us to update the URL and create a new entry in the browsing history without reloading the HTML.
Note: While the HTML anchor element
<a href>can create hyperlinks to different URLs, it will reload the HTML by default. To prevent this behavior when handling routing with custom JavaScript, use thepreventDefault()function on the click event.
Task
Let’s create a new function to handle navigation in our app:
function navigate(path) {
window.history.pushState({}, path, path);
updateRoute();
}
This function first updates the current URL based on the given path, then updates the template. The property window.location.origin returns the root URL, allowing us to reconstruct a complete URL from a given path.
Now that we have this function, we can address the issue of what happens if a path doesn’t match any defined route. We’ll modify the updateRoute function to add a fallback to one of the existing routes if no match is found.
function updateRoute() {
const path = window.location.pathname;
const route = routes[path];
if (!route) {
return navigate('/login');
}
...
If a route isn’t found, we’ll now redirect to the login page.
Next, let’s create a function to handle link clicks, retrieve the URL, and prevent the browser’s default behavior:
function onLinkClick(event) {
event.preventDefault();
navigate(event.target.href);
}
Finally, let’s complete the navigation system by adding bindings to the Login and Logout links in the HTML:
<a href="/dashboard" onclick="onLinkClick(event)">Login</a>
...
<a href="/login" onclick="onLinkClick(event)">Logout</a>
The event object captures the click event and passes it to our onLinkClick function.
Using the onclick attribute, bind the click event to JavaScript code, in this case, the navigate() function.
Try clicking these links—you should now be able to navigate between the different screens of your app.
✅ The history.pushState method is part of the HTML5 standard and is supported by all modern browsers. If you’re building a web app for older browsers, you can use a hash (#) before the path to implement routing that works with regular anchor navigation and doesn’t reload the page. This was originally intended for creating internal links within a page.
Handling the browser’s back and forward buttons
Using history.pushState creates new entries in the browser’s navigation history. You can check this by holding the back button in your browser—it should display something like this:
If you try clicking the back button a few times, you’ll notice that the current URL changes and the history is updated, but the same template keeps being displayed.
This happens because the app doesn’t know it needs to call updateRoute() whenever the history changes. According to the history.pushState documentation, the popstate event is triggered when the state changes (i.e., when we navigate to a different URL). We’ll use this event to fix the issue.
Task
To ensure the displayed template updates when the browser history changes, we’ll attach a new function that calls updateRoute(). Add this at the bottom of your app.js file:
window.onpopstate = () => updateRoute();
updateRoute();
Note: We used an arrow function here to declare our
popstateevent handler for brevity, but a regular function would work just as well.
Here’s a refresher video on arrow functions:
🎥 Click the image above for a video about arrow functions.
Now try using the back and forward buttons in your browser. The displayed route should update correctly this time.
🚀 Challenge
Add a new template and route for a third page that shows the credits for this app.
Post-Lecture Quiz
Review & Self Study
Routing is one of the surprisingly tricky parts of web development, especially as the web transitions from page refresh behaviors to Single Page Application (SPA) behaviors. Read about how the Azure Static Web App service handles routing. Can you explain why some of the decisions described in that document are necessary?
Assignment
Disclaimer:
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