Update README and add documentation/routes.md

README.md

@@ -40,9 +40,7 @@ Examples
 
 ### Routing
 
-WellRESTed's primary goal is to facilitate mapping of URIs to classes that will provide or accept representations. To do this, create a `Router` instance and load it up with some `Route`s. Each `Route` is simply a mapping of a URI pattern to a class name. The class name represents the `Handler` (any class implementing `HandlerInterface`) which the router will dispatch when it receives a request for the given URI. **The handlers are never instantiated or loaded unless they are needed.**
+WellRESTed's primary goal is to facilitate mapping of URIs to classes that will provide or accept representations. To do this, create a `Router` instance and load it up with some `Route`s. Each `Route` is simply a mapping of a URI pattern to a class name. The class name represents the "handler" (any class implementing `HandlerInterface`) which the router will dispatch when it receives a request for the given URI. **The handlers are never instantiated or loaded unless they are needed.**
-
-Here's an example of a Router that will handle two URIs:
 
 ```php
 // Build the router.
@@ -55,6 +53,9 @@ $myRouter->addRoutes(array(
 $myRouter->respond();
 ```
 
+See [Routes](documentation/routes.md) to learn about the various route classes.
+
+
 ### Building Routes with JSON
 
 WellRESTed also provides a class to construct routes for you based on a JSON description. Here's an example.
@@ -98,7 +99,7 @@ For most cases, you'll want to use a subclass of the `Handler` class, which prov
 
 If your endpoint should reject particular verbs, no worries. The Handler base class defines the default verb-handling methods to respond with a **405 Method Not Allowed** status.
 
-Here's a simple Handler that matches the first endpoint, `/cats/`.
+Here's a simple Handler that allows `GET` and `POST`.
 
 ```php
 class CatsCollectionHandler extends \pjdietz\WellRESTed\Handler
@@ -128,14 +129,23 @@ class CatsCollectionHandler extends \pjdietz\WellRESTed\Handler
 }
 ```
 
-This Handler works with the endpoint, `/cats/{id}`. The template for this endpoint has the variable `{id}` in it. The Handler can access path variables through its `args` member, which is an associative array of variables from the URI.
+#### Path Variables
 
+When you use a `TemplateRoute` with variables (or a `RegexRoute` with capture groups), you can access the variables (or captures) through the `Handler` member variable `$args`.
+
+Create this route...
+```php
+$route = TemplateRoute("/cats/{id}", "CatItemHandler");
+```
+
+...which dispatches a `CatItemHandler` instance.
 ```php
 class CatItemHandler extends \pjdietz\WellRESTed\Handler
 {
     protected function get()
     {
         // Find a cat ($cat) based on $this->args["id"]
+        $id = $this->args["id"]
         // ...do lookup here...
 
         if ($cat) {

documentation/routes.md

@@ -0,0 +1,148 @@
+# Routes
+
+WellRESTed comes with a few Route classes:
+
+- `StaticRoute`: Matches requests paths exactly
+- `TemplateRoute`: Matches URI templates
+- `RegexRoute`: Matches a custom regular expression
+
+Each works basically the same way: It first checks to see if it is a match for the request. If it's a match, it instantiates a specific class implementing the `HandlerInterface` (autoloading the class, if needed). Finally, it uses the handler class to provide a response.
+
+If the route does not match the request, it returns `null`.
+
+## StaticRoute
+
+Use a `StaticRoute` when you know the exact path you want to handle.
+
+```php
+$router = new Router();
+$router->addRoute(new StaticRoute("/", "RootHandler"));
+$router->addRoute(new StaticRoute("/cats/", "CatCollectionHandler"));
+$myRouter->respond();
+```
+
+This `Router` will now use a `RootHandler` for requests for the path `/` and `CatCollectionHandler` for requests to `/cats/`. The router doesn't know about any other paths, so any other requests will result in a 404 Not Found response.
+
+You can also make a `StaticRoute` that matches multiple exact paths. For example, suppose you have a multi-use `AnimalHandler` that you want to invoke to handle requests to `/cats/`, `/dogs`, and `/birds`. You can make this by passing an array instead of a string as the first parameter.
+
+```php
+$route = new StaticRoute(array("/cats/", "/dogs/", "/birds"), "AnimalHandler");
+```
+
+## TemplateRoute
+
+`StaticRoutes` are the best choice if you know the exact path up front. But, what if you want to handle a path that expects an ID or other variable? That's where the `TemplateRoute` comes in.
+
+Here's a route that will match a request to a specific cat by ID and send it to a `CatItemHandler`.
+
+```php
+$route = new TemplateRoute("/cats/{id}", "CatItemHandler");
+```
+
+TemplateRoutes use URI templates to match requests to handlers. To include a variable in your template, enclose it in `{}`. The variable will be extracted and made available for the handler in the handler's `args` member.
+
+```php
+class CatItemHandlder extends \pjdietz\WellRESTed\Handler
+{
+    protected function get()
+    {
+        // Access the {id} variable from the $this->args member.
+        $id = $this->args["id"];
+        // ...Do something with the {id}.
+    }
+}
+```
+
+Your template may have multiple variables. Be sure to give each a unique name.
+
+With this `TemplateRoute`...
+
+```php
+$route = new TemplateRoute("/cats/{catId}/{dogId}", "CatItemHandler");
+```
+
+...the handler will have access to `$this->args["catId"]` and `$this->args["dogId"]`.
+
+
+### Default Variable Pattern
+
+By default, the `TemplateRoute` will accept for a variable any value consisting of numbers, letters, underscores, and hyphens. You can change this behavior by passing a pattern to use as the third parameter of the constructor. Here we'll restrict the template to only match numeric values.
+
+```php
+$route = new TemplateRoute("/cats/{id}", "CatItemHandler", TemplateRoute::RE_NUM);
+```
+
+The `TemplateRoute` includes constants for some common situations. The value of each constant is a partial regular expression. You can use one of the constants, or provide your own partial regular expression.
+
+### Pattern Constants
+
+| Constant   | Pattern           | Description |
+| ---------  | ----------------- | ----------- |
+| `RE_SLUG`  | `[0-9a-zA-Z\-_]+` | "URL-friendly" characters such as numbers, letters, underscores, and hyphens |
+| `RE_NUM`   | `[0-9]+` | Digits only |
+| `RE_ALPHA` | `[a-zA-Z]+` | Letters only |
+| `RE_ALPHANUM` | `[0-9a-zA-Z]+` | Letters and digits |
+
+### Variable Patterns Array
+
+You can also set a different pattern for each variable. To do this, pass an array to the `TemplateRoute` constructor as the fourth paramter. The array must have variable names as keys and patterns as values.
+
+```php
+$patterns = array(
+    "id" => TemplateRoute::RE_NUM,
+    "name" => TemplateRoute::RE_ALPHA,
+);
+$route = new TemplateRoute(
+    "/cats/{id}/{name}/{more}",
+    "CatItemHandler",
+    TemplateRoute::RE_SLUG,
+    $patterns);
+```
+
+Here, `{id}` will need to match digits, `{name}` must be all letters, and since `{more}` is not explicitly provided in the `$patterns` array, it uses the default `TemplateRoute::RE_SLUG` passed as the thrid parameter.
+
+### RegexRoute
+
+If `TemplateRoute` doesn't give you enough control, you can make a route that matches a regular expression.
+
+```php
+$route = new RegexRoute("~/cat/[0-9]+~", "CatHandler")
+```
+
+This will match `/cat/102` or `/cat/999` or what have you. To make this more useful, we can add a capture group. The captures are made available to the `Handler` as the `$this->args` member, as with the URI template variables for the `TemplateRoute`
+
+Note the entire matched path will always be the `0` item, and captured groups will begin at `1`.
+
+So this route...
+
+```php
+$route = new RegexRoute("~/cat/([0-9]+)~", "CatHandler")
+```
+
+...with the path `/cat/99` creates this array of matches:
+
+```
+Array
+(
+    [0] => /cat/99
+    [1] => 99
+)
+```
+
+You can also used named capture groups like this;
+
+
+```php
+$route = new RegexRoute("~/cat/(?<id>[0-9]+)~", "CatHandler")
+```
+
+...with the path `/cat/99` creates this array or matches:
+
+```
+Array
+(
+    [0] => /cat/99
+    [1] => 99
+    [id] => 99
+)
+```