Rails 5 improves route search with advanced options

rails routes shows all the routes in the application.

$ rake routes

Prefix       Verb   URI Pattern                   Controller#Action
wishlist_user GET    /users/:id/wishlist(.:format) users#wishlist
        users GET    /users(.:format)              users#index
              POST   /users(.:format)              users#create
     new_user GET    /users/new(.:format)          users#new
    edit_user GET    /users/:id/edit(.:format)     users#edit
         user GET    /users/:id(.:format)          users#show
              PATCH  /users/:id(.:format)          users#update
              PUT    /users/:id(.:format)          users#update
              DELETE /users/:id(.:format)          users#destroy
     products GET    /products(.:format)           products#index
              POST   /products(.:format)           products#create
and so on ......

This list can be lengthy and it could be difficult to locate exactly what user is looking for.

Ways to search specific routes prior to Rails 5

To see only specific routes we can use commands like grep.

$ rake routes | grep products
Prefix       Verb   URI Pattern                   Controller#Action
products      GET    /products(.:format)           products#index
              POST   /products(.:format)           products#create

Options with Rails 5

Rails 5 has added options in rails routes to perform pattern matching on routes.

Controller specific search

Use option -c to search for routes related to controller. Also remember that Rails does case insensitive search. So rails routes -c users is same as rails routes -c Users.

# Search for Controller name
$ rails routes -c users
       Prefix Verb   URI Pattern                   Controller#Action
wishlist_user GET    /users/:id/wishlist(.:format) users#wishlist
        users GET    /users(.:format)              users#index
              POST   /users(.:format)              users#create

# Search for namespaced Controller name.
$ rails routes -c admin/users
         Prefix Verb   URI Pattern                     Controller#Action
    admin_users GET    /admin/users(.:format)          admin/users#index
                POST   /admin/users(.:format)          admin/users#create

# Search for namespaced Controller name.
$ rails routes -c Admin::UsersController
         Prefix Verb   URI Pattern                     Controller#Action
    admin_users GET    /admin/users(.:format)          admin/users#index
                POST   /admin/users(.:format)          admin/users#create

Pattern specific search

Use -g option to do general purpose pattern matching. This results in any routes that partially matches Prefix, Controller#Action or the URI pattern.

# Search with pattern
$ rails routes -g wishlist
       Prefix Verb URI Pattern                   Controller#Action
wishlist_user GET  /users/:id/wishlist(.:format) users#wishlist

# Search with HTTP Verb
$ rails routes -g POST
    Prefix Verb URI Pattern            Controller#Action
           POST /users(.:format)       users#create
           POST /admin/users(.:format) admin/users#create
           POST /products(.:format)    products#create

# Search with URI pattern
$ rails routes -g admin
       Prefix Verb   URI Pattern                     Controller#Action
  admin_users GET    /admin/users(.:format)          admin/users#index
              POST   /admin/users(.:format)          admin/users#create

Note that using CONTROLLER=some_controller has now been deprecated. This had the same effect as searching for a controller specific route.