Routing

Route methods

Map URLs to handler functions. Wapka supports all standard HTTP verbs:

local app = framework()

app:get("/users", handler)       -- read
app:post("/users", handler)      -- create
app:put("/users/:id", handler)   -- full update
app:patch("/users/:id", handler)  -- partial update
app:delete("/users/:id", handler) -- remove
app:head("/users", handler)      -- headers only (also auto-matches GET)
app:any("/webhook", handler)     -- any method

Path parameters

Capture dynamic URL segments with :name:

-- /blog/hello-world  →  ctx.params.slug = "hello-world"
app:get("/blog/:slug", function(ctx)
    local post = api.posts.list({ search = ctx.params.slug })
    return ctx:render("post", { post = post.items[1] })
end)

-- /blog/2026/05/launch-day  →  ctx.params.year, .month, .slug
app:get("/blog/:year/:month/:slug", function(ctx)
    return {
        year = ctx.params.year,
        month = ctx.params.month,
        slug = ctx.params.slug
    }
end)

Wildcard routes

Capture everything after a path segment with *:

-- /files/docs/report.pdf  →  ctx.params.path = "docs/report.pdf"
app:get("/files/*path", function(ctx)
    return { file = ctx.params.path }
end)

Route groups

Group routes under a common prefix — keeps large apps organized:

app:group("/api/v1", function()
    app:get("/status", statusHandler)     -- → /api/v1/status
    app:get("/users", listUsers)          -- → /api/v1/users
    app:post("/users", createUser)        -- → /api/v1/users
end)

app:group("/admin", function()
    app:get("/dashboard", adminHome, { middleware = "admin" })
    app:get("/users", adminUsers, { middleware = { "auth", "admin" } })
end)

Named routes + URL generation

Name a route so you can generate URLs from code — never hardcode URLs:

app:get("/blog/:slug", postHandler, { name = "blog.post" })

-- Generate URL anywhere:
local url = app:url("blog.post", { slug = "hello-world" })
-- → "/blog/hello-world"

Use this in templates, redirects, emails — update the route definition and all links follow.

Route options

The third argument to any route method is an options table:

app:post("/webhook/stripe", stripeHandler, {
    name = "stripe.webhook",          -- named route
    middleware = { "json" },          -- route-level middleware
    csrf = false,                     -- disable CSRF for this route
})

Error responses

Wapka handles missing routes automatically:

• 404 — No route matches the URL
• 405 — URL matches a route but with the wrong HTTP method

Your app doesn't need a catch-all unless you want custom 404 pages.

Next: Request & Environment — read incoming data.