How do I handle 404s in manual Node.js routing?
If no route matches after checking all your routes, send a 404 response with response.writeHead(404) and response.end('Not Found'). This is what Express does with its default error handler when no route matches.
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More FAQs in How to Do Manual Routing in Node.js Without Express
Parse request.url with the URL module, check request.method, use a switch or if to match routes, handle 404s for unknown routes, and extract route parameters by splitting the path. This is manual routing that Express formalizes.
Because it teaches how HTTP routing works under the hood. Express abstracts this, but understanding it manually makes Express more meaningful and helps you debug routing issues at a deeper level.
Use the URL module: new URL(request.url, 'http://localhost').searchParams gives you a URLSearchParams object with get and getAll methods for query parameters.
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