Returns the same patterns you provide, sorted by specificity.

> Important: Your _original_ array is mutated!


#### patterns
Type: Array

A list of route pattern strings.

Route Patterns

The supported route pattern types are:

* static – /users
* named parameters – /users/:id
* nested parameters – /users/:id/books/:title
* optional parameters – /users/:id?/books/:title?
* suffixed parameters – /movies/:title.mp4, /movies/:title.(mp4|mov)
wildcards – /users/

Specificity

While this working definition may not apply _completely_ across the board, route-sort is meant to sort Express-like routing patterns in a safe manner, such that a serial traversal of the sorted array will always give you the most specific match.

You may use regexparam to convert the patterns into RegExp instances, and then use those to test an incoming URL against the patterns. We'll do that in the example below:

`js
import rsort from 'route-sort';
import toRegExp from 'regexparam';

// We have multiple Author-based routes
// Note: These are currently an unsorted mess
const routes = ['/authors', '/authors/*', '/authors/:username/posts', '/authors/:username'];

rsort(routes);
// Now, our routes are sorted correctly!
//=> [ '/authors', '/authors/:username', '/authors/:username/posts', '/authors/*' ]

// Let's make an inefficent DEMO function to:
// 1) loop thru the routes array
// 2) convert each pattern to a RegExp (repetitive)
// 3) test the RegExp to see if we had a match
function find(path) {
for (let i=0; i < routes.length; i++) {
let { pattern } = toRegExp(routes[i]);
if (pattern.test(path)) return routes[i];
}
return false; // no match
}

find('/authors'); //=> "/authors"
find('/authors/lukeed'); //=> "/authors/:username"
find('/authors/foo/bar/baz'); //=> "/authors/*"
find('/authors/lukeed/posts'); //=> "/authors/:username/posts"
find('/hello/moto'); //=> false

// Sorting was important here, but otherwise our
// original routes list would have matched "/authors/*"
// against every path except /hello/moto and /authors.

// Cya!
`

Related

* regexparam – convert route patterns to RegExp` instances
* route-manifest – runtime parser of the Route Manifest format
* webpack-route-manifest – generate a Route Manifest file for your webpack build

License

MIT © Luke Edwards