Root route in Ruby on Rails - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Setting a Root Route in Rails

📖 Scenario: You are building a simple Rails web application for a local bookstore. You want visitors to see a welcome page when they visit the main website address.

🎯 Goal: Set up a root route in Rails so that the homepage shows the home#index action when users visit the base URL.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a controller named home with an index action

Add a root route in config/routes.rb pointing to home#index

Ensure the root route is the first route defined

Use Rails routing syntax correctly

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Setting a root route is essential for any Rails website to define what users see first when they visit the site.

💼 Career

Understanding routing and root routes is a fundamental skill for Rails developers working on web applications.

1

Create the Home Controller with Index Action

Create a controller named home_controller.rb inside app/controllers with a class HomeController that has an empty method index.

Ruby on Rails

# Your code here to create HomeController with index action

Need a hint?

Use class HomeController < ApplicationController and define def index inside it.

2

Open the Routes File

Open the config/routes.rb file to prepare for adding the root route.

Ruby on Rails

# Open config/routes.rb to add root route

Need a hint?

Make sure you have Rails.application.routes.draw do and end in config/routes.rb.

3

Add the Root Route

Inside Rails.application.routes.draw do, add the root route using root 'home#index' to point the base URL to the index action of HomeController.

Ruby on Rails

Rails.application.routes.draw do
  # Add root route here
end

Need a hint?

Use root 'home#index' inside the routes block.

4

Verify the Root Route Placement

Ensure the root route root 'home#index' is the first route inside the Rails.application.routes.draw do block in config/routes.rb.

Ruby on Rails

Rails.application.routes.draw do
  # Confirm root route is first
  root 'home#index'
end

Need a hint?

The root route should be the first line inside the routes block.