Working with route elements

Even when GET and named parameters can be useful in most situations, we may need to further optimize our application URLs for better search engine rankings.

Fortunately, CakePHP provides us with route elements, a solution that maintains the flexibility of GET and named parameters, and improves the way intra-application URLs are built.

Getting ready

We need some sample data to work with. Follow the Getting ready section of the recipe Using GET and named parameters.

How to do it...

1. 1. We want our article URLs to be further optimized for search engines, so we start by creating a new route. Edit your app/config/routes.php file and add the following route at the end of the file:

   Router::connect('/article/:category/:id-:title',
   array('controller' => 'articles', 'action' => 'view'),
   array(
   'pass' => array('id'),
   'id' => '\d+',
   'category' => '[^-]+',
   'title' => '[^-]+'
   )
   );
   

2. 2. As our route defines three elements (id, category, and title), we need to modify...