CODEWITHSUNDEEP
node.jsexpresshttphttp-status-code-404server-side-rendering
cbdeveloper
cbdeveloper

Reputation: 31365

What HTTP status should I use to send a 404 page?

I have a single page app in which all the routing is done on the client, using react-router-dom.

My app allows a set of exact match routes.

For any route out of that set, it will be considered invalid and the client code will redirect you to the /404-page route.

So I need to do the same when I'm rendering on the server.

This is the flow:

I guess I should set status = 404. Because that route was not found, right?

Something like:

// YOU'VE REQUESTED SOME /invalid-route

res.status(404).redirect(ROUTES.NOT_FOUND);

But now you gonna ask my server for the /404-page route. Which will actually render a 404 Page

Should I use 200 Ok ? Since my /404-page is a valid and existing URL that will actually render something?

// NOW YOU ARE REQUESTING MY /404-page

res.status(200).send( // 404 PAGE HTML );

Is this the right way of doing this?

UPDATE:

My question was assuming something wrong.

When a user asks for a /invalid-url, you can't send a 404 and redirect at the same time.

Because the following code:

// YOU'VE REQUESTED SOME /invalid-route

res.status(404).redirect(ROUTES.NOT_FOUND);

// NOW YOU ARE REQUESTING MY /404-page

res.status(200).send( // 404 PAGE HTML );

Produced the following result:

[![enter image description here][1]][1]

The redirect was done using 302 even though I was using res.status(404)..

This is not intended at all. Because no 404 status was emitted.

So I guess we should redirect /invalid-route with 302 or 301, and send the 404 for the /404-page

Something like:

// YOU'VE REQUESTED SOME /invalid-route

res.status(302).redirect(ROUTES.NOT_FOUND);

// NOW YOU ARE REQUESTING MY /404-page

res.status(404).send( // 404 PAGE HTML );

UPDATE 2:

This does not work as intended to send a 301

// THIS SENDS A 302, EVEN THOUGH SETTING 301

res.status(301).redirect(ROUTES.NOT_FOUND);

To send a 301 on a redirect, I had to do:

// THIS SYNTAX ALLOWS YOU TO CHOOSE THE STATUS CODE FOR THE REDIRECT

res.redirect(301,ROUTES.NOT_FOUND);
``´


  [1]: https://i.sstatic.net/jNnfN.png

Upvotes: 1

Views: 74

Answers (1)

Dylan Landry
Dylan Landry

Reputation: 1290

My gut says that a 404 page should always return a 404 status. If it comes with an actual page to display that 404 message, then that's fine. This is what I think is intuitive.

This is my mental picture for this request flow:

  1. Client GET /invalid-route -> Server
  2. Server 404 <Redirect to="/404-page"/> -> Client
  3. Client GET /404-page -> Server
  4. Server 404 /404-page -> Client

I think the confusion comes from thinking of the 404 page as an existing resource which should return 200 when requested. I prefer to think of the 404 page as less of a page and more of a 404 status code with some human redable html to render the code.

Upvotes: 1

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