346 lines
16 KiB
Markdown
346 lines
16 KiB
Markdown
# Server-side Rendering (SSR): An intro to Angular Universal
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This guide describes **Angular Universal**, a technology that renders Angular applications on the server.
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A normal Angular application executes in the _browser_, rendering pages in the DOM in response to user actions.
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Angular Universal executes on the _server_, generating _static_ application pages that later get bootstrapped on
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the client. This means that the application generally renders more quickly, giving users a chance to view the application
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layout before it becomes fully interactive.
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For a more detailed look at different techniques and concepts surrounding SSR, please check out this
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[article](https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2019/02/rendering-on-the-web).
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You can easily prepare an app for server-side rendering using the [Angular CLI](guide/glossary#cli).
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The CLI schematic `@nguniversal/express-engine` performs the required steps, as described below.
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<div class="alert is-helpful">
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**Note:** [Download the finished sample code](generated/zips/universal/universal.zip),
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which runs in a [Node.js® Express](https://expressjs.com/) server.
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</div>
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{@a the-example}
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## Universal tutorial
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The [Tour of Heroes tutorial](tutorial) is the foundation for this walkthrough.
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In this example, the Angular CLI compiles and bundles the Universal version of the app with the
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[Ahead-of-Time (AoT) compiler](guide/aot-compiler).
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A Node Express web server compiles HTML pages with Universal based on client requests.
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To create the server-side app module, `app.server.module.ts`, run the following CLI command.
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<code-example format="." language="bash">
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ng add @nguniversal/express-engine --clientProject angular.io-example
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</code-example>
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The command creates the following folder structure.
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<code-example format="." language="none" linenums="false">
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src/
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index.html <i>app web page</i>
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main.ts <i>bootstrapper for client app</i>
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main.server.ts <i>* bootstrapper for server app</i>
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style.css <i>styles for the app</i>
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app/ ... <i>application code</i>
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app.server.module.ts <i>* server-side application module</i>
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server.ts <i>* express web server</i>
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tsconfig.json <i>TypeScript client configuration</i>
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tsconfig.app.json <i>TypeScript client configuration</i>
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tsconfig.server.json <i>* TypeScript server configuration</i>
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tsconfig.spec.json <i>TypeScript spec configuration</i>
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package.json <i>npm configuration</i>
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webpack.server.config.js <i>* webpack server configuration</i>
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</code-example>
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The files marked with `*` are new and not in the original tutorial sample.
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### Universal in action
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To start rendering your app with Universal on your local system, use the following command.
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<code-example format="." language="bash" linenums="false">
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npm run build:ssr && npm run serve:ssr
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</code-example>
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Open a browser and navigate to http://localhost:4000/.
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You should see the familiar Tour of Heroes dashboard page.
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Navigation via `routerLinks` works correctly because they use the native anchor (`<a>`) tags.
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You can go from the Dashboard to the Heroes page and back.
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You can click a hero on the Dashboard page to display its Details page.
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If you throttle your network speed so that the client-side scripts take longer to download (instructions below),
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you'll notice:
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* Clicking a hero on the Heroes page does nothing.
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* You can't add or delete a hero.
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* The search box on the Dashboard page is ignored.
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* The *Back* and *Save* buttons on the Details page don't work.
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User events other than `routerLink` clicks aren't supported.
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You must wait for the full client app to bootstrap and run, or buffer the events using libraries like
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[preboot](https://github.com/angular/preboot), which allow you to replay these events once the client-side scripts load.
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The transition from the server-rendered app to the client app happens quickly on a development machine, but you should
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always test your apps in real-world scenarios.
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You can simulate a slower network to see the transition more clearly as follows:
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1. Open the Chrome Dev Tools and go to the Network tab.
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1. Find the [Network Throttling](https://developers.google.com/web/tools/chrome-devtools/network-performance/reference#throttling)
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dropdown on the far right of the menu bar.
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1. Try one of the "3G" speeds.
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The server-rendered app still launches quickly but the full client app may take seconds to load.
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{@a why-do-it}
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## Why use server-side rendering?
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There are three main reasons to create a Universal version of your app.
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1. Facilitate web crawlers through [search engine optimization (SEO)](https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en//webmasters/docs/search-engine-optimization-starter-guide.pdf)
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1. Improve performance on mobile and low-powered devices
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1. Show the first page quickly with a [first-contentful paint (FCP)](https://developers.google.com/web/tools/lighthouse/audits/first-contentful-paint)
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{@a seo}
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{@a web-crawlers}
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### Facilitate web crawlers (SEO)
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Google, Bing, Facebook, Twitter, and other social media sites rely on web crawlers to index your application content and
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make that content searchable on the web.
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These web crawlers may be unable to navigate and index your highly interactive Angular application as a human user could do.
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Angular Universal can generate a static version of your app that is easily searchable, linkable, and navigable without JavaScript.
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Universal also makes a site preview available since each URL returns a fully rendered page.
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{@a no-javascript}
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### Improve performance on mobile and low-powered devices
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Some devices don't support JavaScript or execute JavaScript so poorly that the user experience is unacceptable.
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For these cases, you may require a server-rendered, no-JavaScript version of the app.
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This version, however limited, may be the only practical alternative for
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people who otherwise couldn't use the app at all.
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{@a startup-performance}
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### Show the first page quickly
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Displaying the first page quickly can be critical for user engagement.
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[53 percent of mobile site visits are abandoned](https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/marketing-resources/data-measurement/mobile-page-speed-new-industry-benchmarks/)
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if pages take longer than 3 seconds to load.
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Your app may have to launch faster to engage these users before they decide to do something else.
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With Angular Universal, you can generate landing pages for the app that look like the complete app.
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The pages are pure HTML, and can display even if JavaScript is disabled.
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The pages don't handle browser events, but they _do_ support navigation through the site using [`routerLink`](guide/router#router-link).
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In practice, you'll serve a static version of the landing page to hold the user's attention.
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At the same time, you'll load the full Angular app behind it.
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The user perceives near-instant performance from the landing page
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and gets the full interactive experience after the full app loads.
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{@a how-does-it-work}
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## Universal web servers
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A Universal web server responds to application page requests with static HTML rendered by the [Universal template engine](#universal-engine).
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The server receives and responds to HTTP requests from clients (usually browsers), and serves static assets such as scripts, CSS, and images.
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It may respond to data requests, either directly or as a proxy to a separate data server.
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The sample web server for this guide is based on the popular [Express](https://expressjs.com/) framework.
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<div class="alert is-helpful">
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**Note:** _Any_ web server technology can serve a Universal app as long as it can call Universal's `renderModuleFactory()` function.
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The principles and decision points discussed here apply to any web server technology.
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</div>
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Universal applications use the Angular `platform-server` package (as opposed to `platform-browser`), which provides
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server implementations of the DOM, `XMLHttpRequest`, and other low-level features that don't rely on a browser.
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The server ([Node Express](https://expressjs.com/) in this guide's example)
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passes client requests for application pages to the NgUniversal `ngExpressEngine`. Under the hood, this
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calls Universal's `renderModuleFactory()` function, while providing caching and other helpful utilities.
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The `renderModuleFactory()` function takes as inputs a *template* HTML page (usually `index.html`),
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an Angular *module* containing components,
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and a *route* that determines which components to display.
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The route comes from the client's request to the server.
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Each request results in the appropriate view for the requested route.
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The `renderModuleFactory()` function renders the view within the `<app>` tag of the template,
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creating a finished HTML page for the client.
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Finally, the server returns the rendered page to the client.
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### Working around the browser APIs
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Because a Universal app doesn't execute in the browser, some of the browser APIs and capabilities may be missing on the server.
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For example, server-side applications can't reference browser-only global objects such as `window`, `document`, `navigator`, or `location`.
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Angular provides some injectable abstractions over these objects, such as [`Location`](api/common/Location)
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or [`DOCUMENT`](api/common/DOCUMENT); it may substitute adequately for these APIs.
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If Angular doesn't provide it, it's possible to write new abstractions that delegate to the browser APIs while in the browser
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and to an alternative implementation while on the server (aka shimming).
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Similarly, without mouse or keyboard events, a server-side app can't rely on a user clicking a button to show a component.
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The app must determine what to render based solely on the incoming client request.
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This is a good argument for making the app [routable](guide/router).
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{@a http-urls}
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### Using absolute URLs for server requests
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The tutorial's `HeroService` and `HeroSearchService` delegate to the Angular `HttpClient` module to fetch application data.
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These services send requests to _relative_ URLs such as `api/heroes`.
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In a Universal app, HTTP URLs must be _absolute_ (for example, `https://my-server.com/api/heroes`).
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This means you need to change your services to make requests with absolute URLs when running on the server and with relative
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URLs when running in the browser.
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One solution is to provide the full URL to your application on the server, and write an interceptor that can retrieve this
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value and prepend it to the request URL. If you're using the `ngExpressEngine`, as shown in the example in this guide, half
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the work is already done. We'll assume this is the case, but it's trivial to provide the same functionality.
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Start by creating an [HttpInterceptor](api/common/http/HttpInterceptor):
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<code-example format="." language="typescript">
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import {Injectable, Inject, Optional} from '@angular/core';
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import {HttpInterceptor, HttpHandler, HttpRequest, HttpHeaders} from '@angular/common/http';
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import {Request} from 'express';
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import {REQUEST} from '@nguniversal/express-engine/tokens';
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@Injectable()
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export class UniversalInterceptor implements HttpInterceptor {
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constructor(@Optional() @Inject(REQUEST) protected request: Request) {}
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intercept(req: HttpRequest<any>, next: HttpHandler) {
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let serverReq: HttpRequest<any> = req;
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if (this.request) {
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let newUrl = `${this.request.protocol}://${this.request.get('host')}`;
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if (!req.url.startsWith('/')) {
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newUrl += '/';
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}
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newUrl += req.url;
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serverReq = req.clone({url: newUrl});
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}
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return next.handle(serverReq);
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}
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}
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</code-example>
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Next, provide the interceptor in the providers for the server `AppModule` (app.server.module.ts):
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<code-example format="." language="typescript">
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import {HTTP_INTERCEPTORS} from '@angular/common/http';
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import {UniversalInterceptor} from './universal-interceptor';
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@NgModule({
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...
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providers: [{
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provide: HTTP_INTERCEPTORS,
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useClass: UniversalInterceptor,
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multi: true
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}],
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})
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export class AppServerModule {}
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</code-example>
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Now, on every HTTP request made on the server, this interceptor will fire and replace the request URL with the absolute
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URL provided in the Express `Request` object.
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{@a universal-engine}
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### Universal template engine
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The important bit in the `server.ts` file is the `ngExpressEngine()` function.
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<code-example path="universal/server.ts" header="server.ts" region="ngExpressEngine">
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</code-example>
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The `ngExpressEngine()` function is a wrapper around Universal's `renderModuleFactory()` function which turns a client's
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requests into server-rendered HTML pages.
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* The first parameter is `AppServerModule`.
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It's the bridge between the Universal server-side renderer and the Angular application.
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* The second parameter, `extraProviders`, is optional. It lets you specify dependency providers that apply only when
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running on this server.
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You can do this when your app needs information that can only be determined by the currently running server instance.
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One example could be the running server's *origin*, which could be used to [calculate absolute HTTP URLs](#http-urls) if
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not using the `Request` token as shown above.
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The `ngExpressEngine()` function returns a `Promise` callback that resolves to the rendered page.
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It's up to the engine to decide what to do with that page.
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This engine's `Promise` callback returns the rendered page to the web server,
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which then forwards it to the client in the HTTP response.
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<div class="alert is-helpful">
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**Note:** These wrappers help hide the complexity of the `renderModuleFactory()` function. There are more wrappers
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for different backend technologies at the [Universal repository](https://github.com/angular/universal).
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</div>
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### Filtering request URLs
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NOTE: the basic behavior described below is handled automatically when using the NgUniversal Express schematic, this
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is helpful when trying to understand the underlying behavior or replicate it without using the schematic.
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The web server must distinguish _app page requests_ from other kinds of requests.
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It's not as simple as intercepting a request to the root address `/`.
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The browser could ask for one of the application routes such as `/dashboard`, `/heroes`, or `/detail:12`.
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In fact, if the app were only rendered by the server, _every_ app link clicked would arrive at the server
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as a navigation URL intended for the router.
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Fortunately, application routes have something in common: their URLs lack file extensions.
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(Data requests also lack extensions but they're easy to recognize because they always begin with `/api`.)
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All static asset requests have a file extension (such as `main.js` or `/node_modules/zone.js/dist/zone.js`).
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Because we use routing, we can easily recognize the three types of requests and handle them differently.
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1. **Data request**: request URL that begins `/api`.
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1. **App navigation**: request URL with no file extension.
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1. **Static asset**: all other requests.
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A Node Express server is a pipeline of middleware that filters and processes requests one after the other.
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You configure the Node Express server pipeline with calls to `app.get()` like this one for data requests.
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<code-example path="universal/server.ts" header="server.ts (data URL)" region="data-request" linenums="false">
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</code-example>
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<div class="alert is-helpful">
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**Note:** This sample server doesn't handle data requests.
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The tutorial's "in-memory web API" module, a demo and development tool, intercepts all HTTP calls and
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simulates the behavior of a remote data server.
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In practice, you would remove that module and register your web API middleware on the server here.
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</div>
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The following code filters for request URLs with no extensions and treats them as navigation requests.
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<code-example path="universal/server.ts" header="server.ts (navigation)" region="navigation-request" linenums="false">
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</code-example>
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### Serving static files safely
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A single `app.use()` treats all other URLs as requests for static assets
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such as JavaScript, image, and style files.
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To ensure that clients can only download the files that they are permitted to see, put all client-facing asset files in
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the `/dist` folder and only honor requests for files from the `/dist` folder.
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The following Node Express code routes all remaining requests to `/dist`, and returns a `404 - NOT FOUND` error if the
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file isn't found.
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<code-example path="universal/server.ts" header="server.ts (static files)" region="static" linenums="false">
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</code-example>
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