CODEWITHSUNDEEP
ajaxexpresshttp-delete
ashish7249
ashish7249

Reputation: 289

redirection after 'delete' in express

From the client side, I am making an Ajax request of type "delete" using jquery.On the server side, I am doing res.redirect(URL).But instead of redirecting, browser is again making a delete request with URL returned from server side for redirecting. However, it is not happening for a post request.Everything is OK with post request.

Upvotes: 2

Views: 493

Answers (1)

Elliot Blackburn
Elliot Blackburn

Reputation: 4164

Short version

Ajax is trying to follow the request to it's bitter end to get a successful response (2xx). If you want to delete a resource and send the user to a new web page, you will need to handle that after receiving a success response from your Ajax call.

Full explanation

While redirects are sometimes used after processing a request (such as a successful / failed login) it's not really what they're intended for. Generally you would only redirect the user to get them to the resource their looking for. For example, you might move an endpoint such as POST /blog-post to the new location of POST /blog-article. What you're saying to the requester here is that something used to be where it is, but now they need to make a request elsewhere to find what they're after. This is incredibly important when trying to prevent link rot.

The idea of accepting and processing a request, and then moving the user off to another page is more of a coincidence really. It just happens to work due to how a browser handles URL requests.

I expect your POST request is actually using a form, in this case the browser is following the redirect because it received something like a 301 and is attempting to see a request chain through. However when using Ajax a redirect is being handled by the Ajax call itself, not the entire browser. Ajax in this case is acting as if you'd expect if the endpoint had been moved. So for example, if you moved the endpoint on the server side, your application would still function as it would follow the redirect instruction.

What you really need to do is return a successful response to your Ajax call such as a 204 (No content) and then in your frontend move the user on to a new page.

This isn't as convenient I'll admit, but when you understand why the redirects actually exist it makes more sense. They're not a way of telling a user to move onto something else, they're a way of trying to prevent link rot and enable applications to continue working against an API which may have changed slightly.

Upvotes: 2

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