There's a more direct way to do that, which IS an example in the docs: http://docs.racket-lang.org/web-server-internal/web-server.html#%28def._%28%28lib._web-server%2Fweb-server..rkt%29._serve%29%29
I use this very often and have a little program that command-line-izes it: https://github.com/jeapostrophe/exp/blob/master/dir-serve.rkt Jay On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 6:55 AM, Greg Hendershott <[email protected]> wrote: > This is slightly off-topic, but: > > If you want to launch the web server _just_ to serve static files (as > I wanted to do for a "preview" mode for Frog), then it's simply this: > > (serve/servlet (lambda (_) (next-dispatcher)) > #:servlet-path "/" > #:extra-files-paths (list path/to/files) > #:port 8080 ;or whatever > #:launch-browser? #t) ;if you wish > > Although this isn't a very interesting use case, I think it might be a > handy example for the docs. > > On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 8:06 AM, Jay McCarthy <[email protected]> wrote: >> I'm willing to change the docs, but I'd like to try to explain it in >> an email to make sure the explanation is okay. >> >> The key sentence of the documentation is: "start is loaded as a >> servlet and responds to requests that match servlet-regexp." >> >> The default for servlet-regexp is such that the ONLY path that the >> servlet responds to is "/servlets/standalone.rkt" and ALL other paths >> are handled by the static file handlers. >> >> It is common to change the servlet-regexp to something like #rx"", >> which causes ALL requests to be handled by the servlet. When you do >> this, the documentation is still correct, but you may not realize the >> consequence of what you've done. >> >> Throughout the Web server infrastructure, and serve/servlet does not >> change this, if you call (next-dispatcher) then the current responder >> FAILS and the next responder gets a chance. In the context of >> serve/servlet, if you call (next-dispatcher) after using #rx"" to take >> over all requests, then for that particular request where >> (next-dispatcher) was dynamically called, the static handlers take >> over. >> >> It so happens that the default "else" clause in web-server/dispatch is >> to call (next-dispatcher). From the documentation: "If else-fun is >> left out, one is provided that calls (next-dispatcher) to signal to >> the Web Server that this dispatcher does not apply." >> >> Thus, if you use the #rx"" regexp AND dispatch-rules, then it is >> likely that the "right" thing will happen without you trying because >> you won't write an else and then if your servlet doesn't handle the >> request, the static handler will be in control. >> >> Overall, I don't know what the documentation should be changed to say. >> All this is in the documentation right now: you just might not realize >> you are telling the servlet to handle everything, but once you realize >> that you just need to know how to turn that off, and that isn't >> specific in any way to serve/servlet, so I don't feel like it is >> appropriate to put it there. (Alternatively, you should just be more >> specific in your servlet-regexp, by using something like >> (re-complement #rx"/static/.+"), and that's reasonable to expect a >> user to realize, IMHO.) >> >> Jay >> >> >> On Thu, Mar 21, 2013 at 10:55 PM, John Clements >> <[email protected]> wrote: >>> The serve/servlet function has several flags that allude to the ability to >>> serve static files (#:extra-files-paths, etc.). However, nowhere in that >>> documentation does it say under what circumstances the web-server serves >>> content from that pool of files. After much struggling and cursing, I >>> finally found a post by Matt Jadud. Even then, it took me quite a while to >>> realize that the 'dispatch-rules' function was the key to actually allowing >>> some requests to reach the static content. Perhaps the serve/servlet >>> documentation should explicitly specify when content is served from static >>> files, or at least provide a pointer to the dispatch-rules documentation. >>> >>> Thoughts? >>> >>> John >>> >>> >>> ____________________ >>> Racket Users list: >>> http://lists.racket-lang.org/users >> >> >> >> -- >> Jay McCarthy <[email protected]> >> Assistant Professor / Brigham Young University >> http://faculty.cs.byu.edu/~jay >> >> "The glory of God is Intelligence" - D&C 93 >> >> ____________________ >> Racket Users list: >> http://lists.racket-lang.org/users -- Jay McCarthy <[email protected]> Assistant Professor / Brigham Young University http://faculty.cs.byu.edu/~jay "The glory of God is Intelligence" - D&C 93 ____________________ Racket Users list: http://lists.racket-lang.org/users
