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Inertia.js Phoenix Adapter Hex Package Hex Docs

The Elixir/Phoenix adapter for Inertia.js.

Table of Contents

Installation

The package can be installed by adding inertia to your list of dependencies in mix.exs:

def deps do
  [
    {:inertia, "~> 1.0.0-beta.3"}
  ]
end

Add your desired configuration in your config.exs file:

# config/config.exs

config :inertia,
  # The Phoenix Endpoint module for your application. This is used for building
  # asset URLs to compute a unique version hash to track when something has
  # changed (and a reload is required on the frontend).
  endpoint: MyAppWeb.Endpoint,

  # An optional list of static file paths to track for changes. You'll generally
  # want to include any JavaScript assets that may require a page refresh when
  # modified.
  static_paths: ["/assets/app.js"],

  # The default version string to use (if you decide not to track any static
  # assets using the `static_paths` config). Defaults to "1".
  default_version: "1",

  # Enable automatic conversion of prop keys from snake case (e.g. `inserted_at`),
  # which is conventional in Elixir, to camel case (e.g. `insertedAt`), which is
  # conventional in JavaScript. Defaults to `false`.
  camelize_props: false,

  # Instruct the client side whether to encrypt the page object in the window history 
  # state. This can also be set/overridden on a per-request basis, using the `encrypt_history`
  # controller helper. Defaults to `false`.
  history: [encrypt: false],

  # Enable server-side rendering for page responses (requires some additional setup,
  # see instructions below). Defaults to `false`.
  ssr: false,

  # Whether to raise an exception when server-side rendering fails (only applies
  # when SSR is enabled). Defaults to `true`.
  #
  # Recommended: enable in non-production environments and disable in production,
  # so that SSR failures will not cause 500 errors (but instead will fallback to
  # CSR).
  raise_on_ssr_failure: config_env() != :prod

This library includes a few modules to help render Inertia responses:

To get started, import Inertia.Controller in your controller helper and Inertia.HTML in your html helper:

  # lib/my_app_web.ex
  defmodule MyAppWeb do
    def controller do
      quote do
        use Phoenix.Controller, namespace: MyAppWeb

+       import Inertia.Controller
      end
    end

    def html do
      quote do
        use Phoenix.Component

+       import Inertia.HTML
      end
    end
  end

Then, install the plug in your browser pipeline:

  # lib/my_app_web/router.ex
  defmodule MyAppWeb.Router do
    use MyAppWeb, :router

    pipeline :browser do
      plug :accepts, ["html"]

+     plug Inertia.Plug
    end
  end

Next, replace the title tag in your layout with the <.inertia_title> component, so that the client-side library will keep the title in sync, and add the <.inertia_head> component:

  # lib/my_app_web/components/layouts/root.html.heex
  <!DOCTYPE html>
  <html lang="en" class="[scrollbar-gutter:stable]">
    <head>
-     <.live_title><%= assigns[:page_title] %></.live_title>
+     <.inertia_title><%= assigns[:page_title] %></.inertia_title>
+     <.inertia_head content={@inertia_head} />
    </head>

You're now ready to start rendering inertia responses!

Rendering responses

Rendering an Inertia.js response looks like this:

defmodule MyAppWeb.ProfileController do
  use MyAppWeb, :controller

  def index(conn, _params) do
    conn
    |> assign_prop(:text, "Hello world")
    |> render_inertia("ProfilePage")
  end
end

The assign_prop function allows you defined props that should be passed in to the component. The render_inertia function accepts the conn, the name of the component to render, and an optional map containing more initial props to pass to the page component.

This action will render an HTML page containing a <div> element with the name of the component and the initial props, following Inertia.js conventions. On subsequent requests dispatched by the Inertia.js client library, this action will return a JSON response with the data necessary for rendering the page.

If you want to automatically convert your prop keys from snake case (conventional in Elixir) to camel case to keep with JavaScript conventions (e.g. first_name to firstName), you can configure that globally or enable/disable it on a per-request basis.

import Config

config :inertia,
  endpoint: MyAppWeb.Endpoint,
  camelize_props: true

defmodule MyAppWeb.ProfileController do
  use MyAppWeb, :controller

  def index(conn, _params) do
    conn
    |> assign_prop(:first_name, "Bob")
    |> camelize_props()
    |> render_inertia("ProfilePage")
  end
end

Setting up the client-side

The Inertia.js docs provide a good general walk-through on how to setup your JavaScript assets to boot your Inertia app. If you're new to Inertia, we recommend checking that out to familiarize yourself with how it all works. Here we'll provide some guidance on getting your Phoenix app with esbuild configured for basic client-side rendering (and further down, we'll delve into server-side rendering).

To get started, install the Inertia.js library for the frontend framework of your choice. In these instructions we'll use React, but the process is similiar for other Inertia-compatible frameworks, like Vue or Svelte.

cd assets
npm install @inertiajs/react react react-dom

Replace the contents of your app.js file with the Inertia boot function and rename it to app.jsx (since we are using JSX).

// assets/js/app.jsx

import React from "react";
import axios from "axios";

import { createInertiaApp } from "@inertiajs/react";
import { createRoot } from "react-dom/client";

axios.defaults.xsrfHeaderName = "x-csrf-token";

createInertiaApp({
  resolve: async (name) => {
    return await import(`./pages/${name}.jsx`);
  },
  setup({ App, el, props }) {
    createRoot(el).render(<App {...props} />);
  },
});

The example above assumes your pages live in the assets/js/pages directory and have a default export with page component, like this:

// assets/js/pages/Dashboard.jsx

import React from "react";

const Dashboard = () => {
  return (
    <div>
      {/* ... page contents ...*/}
    </div>
  );
}

export default Dashboard;

Next, make some adjustments to your esbuild config:

# config/config.exs

config :esbuild,
  version: "0.21.5",
  my_app: [
    args: ~w(js/app.jsx --bundle --target=es2020 --outdir=../priv/static/assets --external:/fonts/* --external:/images/*),
    cd: Path.expand("../assets", __DIR__),
    env: %{"NODE_PATH" => Path.expand("../deps", __DIR__)}
  ]

If you updated your esbuild version, you'll need to run mix esbuild.install to fetch the new version.

Lazy data evaluation

If you have expensive data for your props that may not always be required (that is, if you plan to use partial reloads), you can wrap your expensive computation in a function and pass the function reference when setting your Inertia props. You may use either an anonymous function (or named function reference) and optionally wrap it with the Inertia.Controller.inertia_optional/1 function.

[!NOTE] inertia_optional props will only be included the when explicitly requested in a partial reload. If you want to include the prop on first visit, you'll want to use a bare anonymous function or named function reference instead. See below for examples of how prop assignment behaves.

Here are some specific examples of how the methods of lazy data evaluation differ:

conn
# ALWAYS included on first visit...
# OPTIONALLY included on partial reloads...
# ALWAYS evaluated...
|> assign_prop(:cheap_thing, cheap_thing())

# ALWAYS included on first visit...
# OPTIONALLY included on partial reloads...
# ONLY evaluated when needed...
|> assign_prop(:expensive_thing, fn -> calculate_thing() end)
|> assign_prop(:another_expensive_thing, &calculate_another_thing/0)

# NEVER included on first visit...
# OPTIONALLY included on partial reloads...
# ONLY evaluated when needed...
|> assign_prop(:super_expensive_thing, inertia_optional(fn -> calculate_thing() end))

Deferred props

Requires Inertia v2.x on the client-side.

If you have expensive data that you'd like to automatically fetch (from the client-side via an async background request) after the page is initially rendered, you can mark the prop as deferred:

conn
|> assign_prop(:expensive_thing, inertia_defer(fn -> calculate_thing() end))

The inertia_defer/1 helper accepts a function argument in the first position. You may optionally use the inertia_defer/2 helper, which accepts a "group" name in the second position:

conn
|> assign_prop(:expensive_thing, inertia_defer(fn -> calculate_thing() end, "dashboard"))

If no group names are specified, then the client-side will issue a single async request to fetch all the deferred props. If there are multiple group names, then the client-side will issue one async request per group instead. This is useful if you have some very expensive data that you'd prefer fetch in parallel alongside other expensive data.

Merge props

Requires Inertia v2.x on the client-side.

If you have prop data that should get merged with the existing data on the client-side on subsequent requests (for example, an array of paginated data being presented in an "infinite scroll" interface), then you can tag the prop value using the inertia_merge/1 helper:

conn
|> assign_prop(:paginated_list, inertia_merge(["a", "b", "c"]))

Merge props can also accept deferred props:

conn
|> assign_prop(:paginated_list, inertia_defer(&calculate_next_page/0) |> inertia_merge())

Shared data

To share data on every request, you can use the assign_prop/2 function inside of a shared plug in your response pipeline. For example, suppose you have a UserAuth plug responsible for fetching the currently-logged in user and you want to be sure all your Inertia components receive that user data. Your plug might look something like this:

defmodule MyApp.UserAuth do
  import Inertia.Controller
  import Phoenix.Controller
  import Plug.Conn

  def authenticate_user(conn, _opts) do
    user = get_user_from_session(conn)
 
    # Here we are storing the user in the conn assigns (so
    # we can use it for things like checking permissions later on),
    # AND we are assigning a serialized represention of the user
    # to our Inertia props.
    conn
    |> assign(:user, user)
    |> assign_prop(:user, serialize_user(user))
  end

  # ...
end

Anywhere this plug is used, the serialized user prop will be passed to the Inertia component.

Validations

Validation errors follow some specific conventions to make wiring up with Inertia's form helpers seamless. The errors prop is managed by this library and is always included in the props object for Inertia components. (When there are no errors, the errors prop will be an empty object).

The assign_errors function is how you tell Inertia what errors should be represented on the front-end. You can either pass an Ecto.Changeset struct or a bare map to the assign_errors function.

def update(conn, params) do
  case MyApp.Settings.update(params) do
    {:ok, _settings} ->
      conn
      |> put_flash(:info, "Settings updated")
      |> redirect(to: ~p"/settings")

    {:error, changeset} ->
      conn
      |> assign_errors(changeset)
      |> redirect(to: ~p"/settings")
  end
end

The assign_errors function will automatically convert the changeset errors into a shape compatible with the client-side adapter. Since Inertia.js expects a flat map of key-value pairs, the error serializer will flatten nested errors down to compound keys:

{
  "name" => "can't be blank",

  // Nested errors keys are flattened with a dot seperator (`.`) 
  "team.name" => "must be at least 3 characters long",

  // Nested arrays are zero-based and indexed using bracket notation (`[0]`)
  "items[1].price" => "must be greater than 0"
}

Errors are automatically preserved across redirects, so you can safely respond with a redirect back to page where the form lives to display form errors.

If you need to construct your own map of errors (rather than pass in a changeset), be sure it's a flat mapping of atom (or string) keys to string values like this:

conn
|> assign_errors(%{
  name: "Name can't be blank",
  password: "Password must be at least 5 characters"
})

Flash messages

This library automatically includes Phoenix flash data in Inertia props, under the flash key.

For example, given the following controller action:

def update(conn, params) do
  case MyApp.Settings.update(params) do
    {:ok, _settings} ->
      conn
      |> put_flash(:info, "Settings updated")
      |> redirect(to: ~p"/settings")

    {:error, changeset} ->
      conn
      |> assign_errors(changeset)
      |> redirect(to: ~p"/settings")
  end
end

When Inertia (or the browser) redirects to the /settings page, the Inertia component will receive the flash props:

{
  "component": "...",
  "props": {
    "flash": {
      "info": "Settings updated"
    },
    // ...
  }
}

CSRF protection

This library automatically sets the XSRF-TOKEN cookie for use by the Axios client on the front-end. Since Phoenix expects to receive the CSRF token via the x-csrf-token header, you'll need to configure Axios in your front-end JavaScript to use that header name:

// assets/js/app.js

import axios from "axios";
axios.defaults.xsrfHeaderName = "x-csrf-token";

// the rest of your Inertia client code...

History

Requires Inertia v2.x on the client-side.

Encryption

If your page props contain sensitive data (such as information about the currently-authenticated user), you can opt to encrypt the history data that's cached in the browser.

conn
|> encrypt_history()

You can also enable history encryption globally in your application config:

config :inertia,
  history: [encrypt: true]

Clearing history

To instruct the client to clear this history (for example, when a user logs out), you can use the clear_history/0 helper when building your response.

conn
|> clear_history()

Testing

The Inertia.Testing module includes helpers for testing your Inertia controller responses, such as the inertia_component/1 and inertia_props/1 functions.

use MyAppWeb.ConnCase

import Inertia.Testing

describe "GET /" do
  test "renders the home page", %{conn: conn} do
    conn = get("/")
    assert inertia_component(conn) == "Home"
    assert %{user: %{id: 1}} = inertia_props(conn)
  end
end

We recommend importing Inertia.Testing in your ConnCase helper, so that it will be at the ready for all your controller tests:

defmodule MyApp.ConnCase do
  use ExUnit.CaseTemplate

  using do
    quote do
      import Inertia.Testing

      # ...
    end
  end
end

Server-side rendering

The Inertia.js client library comes with with server-side rendering (SSR) support, which means you can have your Inertia-powered client hydrate HTML that has been pre-rendered on the server (instead of performing the initial DOM rendering).

[!NOTE] The steps for enabling SSR in Phoenix are similar to other backend frameworks, but instead of running a separate Node.js server process to render HTML, this library spins up a pool of Node.js process workers to handle SSR calls. We'll highlight those differences below.

Add a server-side rendering module

To get started, you'll need to create a JavaScript module that exports a render function to perform the actual server-side rendering of pages. For the purpose of these instructions, we'll assume you're using React. The steps would be similar for other front-end environments supported by Inertia.js, such as Vue and Svelte.

Suppose your main app.jsx file looks something like this:

// assets/js/app.jsx

import React from "react";
import { createInertiaApp } from "@inertiajs/react";
import { createRoot } from "react-dom/client";

createInertiaApp({
  resolve: async (name) => {
    return await import(`./pages/${name}.jsx`);
  },
  setup({ App, el, props }) {
    createRoot(el).render(<App {...props} />);
  },
});

You'll need to create a second JavaScript file (alongside your app.jsx) that exports a render function. Let's name it ssr.jsx.

// assets/js/ssr.jsx

import React from "react";
import ReactDOMServer from "react-dom/server";
import { createInertiaApp } from "@inertiajs/react";

export function render(page) {
  return createInertiaApp({
    page,
    render: ReactDOMServer.renderToString,
    resolve: async (name) => {
      return await import(`./pages/${name}.jsx`);
    },
    setup: ({ App, props }) => <App {...props} />,
  });
}

This is similar to the server entry-point documented here, except we are simply exporting a render function instead of starting a Node.js server process.

Next, configure esbuild to compile the ssr.jsx bundle.

  # config/config.exs

  config :esbuild,
    version: "0.21.5",
    app: [
      args: ~w(js/app.jsx --bundle --target=es2020 --outdir=../priv/static/assets --external:/fonts/* --external:/images/*),
      cd: Path.expand("../assets", __DIR__),
      env: %{"NODE_PATH" => Path.expand("../deps", __DIR__)}
    ],
+   ssr: [
+     args: ~w(js/ssr.jsx --bundle --platform=node --outdir=../priv --format=cjs),
+     cd: Path.expand("../assets", __DIR__),
+     env: %{"NODE_PATH" => Path.expand("../deps", __DIR__)}
+   ]

Add the ssr build to the watchers in your dev environment, alongside the other asset watchers:

  # config/dev.exs
  config :my_app, MyAppWeb.Endpoint,
    # Binding to loopback ipv4 address prevents access from other machines.
    # Change to `ip: {0, 0, 0, 0}` to allow access from other machines.
    http: [ip: {127, 0, 0, 1}, port: 4000],
    check_origin: false,
    code_reloader: true,
    debug_errors: true,
    secret_key_base: "4Z2yyTu6Uy8AM+MguG3oldEf4aIdswR2BsCm1OtqDK0lEv++T02KktRaXfMbC/Zs",
    watchers: [
      esbuild: {Esbuild, :install_and_run, [:app, ~w(--sourcemap=inline --watch)]},
+     ssr: {Esbuild, :install_and_run, [:ssr, ~w(--sourcemap=inline --watch)]},
      tailwind: {Tailwind, :install_and_run, [:my_app, ~w(--watch)]}
    ]

Add the ssr build step to the asset build and deploy scripts.

  # mix.exs

  defp aliases do
    [
      setup: ["deps.get", "ecto.setup", "assets.setup", "assets.build"],
      "ecto.setup": ["ecto.create", "ecto.migrate", "run priv/repo/seeds.exs"],
      "ecto.reset": ["ecto.drop", "ecto.setup"],
      test: ["ecto.create --quiet", "ecto.migrate --quiet", "test"],
      "assets.setup": ["tailwind.install --if-missing", "esbuild.install --if-missing"],
-     "assets.build": ["tailwind app", "esbuild app"],
+     "assets.build": ["tailwind app", "esbuild app", "esbuild ssr"],
      "assets.deploy": [
        "tailwind app --minify",
        "esbuild app --minify",
+       "esbuild ssr",
        "phx.digest"
      ]
    ]
  end

As configured, this will place the generated ssr.js bundle into the priv directory. Since it's generated code, add it to your .gitignore file.

  # .gitignore

+ /priv/ssr.js

Configuring your app for server-rendering

Now that you have a Node.js module capable of server-rendering your pages, let's tell the Inertia.js Phoenix library to use SSR.

First, you'll need to add the Inertia.SSR module to your application supervision tree.

  # lib/my_app/application.ex

  defmodule MyApp.Application do
    use Application

    @impl true
    def start(_type, _args) do
      children = [
        MyAppWeb.Telemetry,
        MyApp.Repo,
        {DNSCluster, query: Application.get_env(:MyApp, :dns_cluster_query) || :ignore},
        {Phoenix.PubSub, name: MyApp.PubSub},
        # Start the Finch HTTP client for sending emails
        {Finch, name: MyApp.Finch},
        # Start a worker by calling: MyApp.Worker.start_link(arg)
        # {MyApp.Worker, arg},

+       # Start the SSR process pool
+       # You must specify a `path` option to locate the directory where the `ssr.js` file lives.
+       {Inertia.SSR, path: Path.join([Application.app_dir(:my_app), "priv"])},

        # Start to serve requests, typically the last entry
        MyAppWeb.Endpoint,
      ]

Then, update your Inertia Elixir configuration to enable SSR.

  # config/config.exs

  config :inertia,
    # The Phoenix Endpoint module for your application. This is used for building
    # asset URLs to compute a unique version hash to track when something has
    # changed (and a reload is required on the frontend).
    endpoint: MyAppWeb.Endpoint,

    # An optional list of static file paths to track for changes. You'll generally
    # want to include any JavaScript assets that may require a page refresh when
    # modified.
    static_paths: ["/assets/app.js"],

    # The default version string to use (if you decide not to track any static
    # assets using the `static_paths` config). Defaults to "1".
    default_version: "1",

    # Enable server-side rendering for page responses (requires some additional setup, 
    # see instructions below). Defaults to `false`.
-   ssr: false
+   ssr: true

    # Whether to raise an exception when server-side rendering fails (only applies
    # when SSR is enabled). Defaults to `true`.
    #
    # Recommended: enable in non-production environments and disable in production,
    # so that SSR failures will not cause 500 errors (but instead will fallback to
    # CSR).
    raise_on_ssr_failure: config_env() != :prod

If you haven't installed node into your runner image add the following command after the FROM ${RUNNER_IMAGE}

FROM ${RUNNER_IMAGE}

RUN apt-get update -y && \
-     apt-get install -y libstdc++6 openssl libncurses5 locales ca-certificates && \
+     apt-get install -y libstdc++6 openssl curl libncurses5 locales ca-certificates && \ # add curl to dependencies
      apt-get clean && rm -f /var/lib/apt/lists/*_*

# Install Node JS from https://deb.nodesource.com/
+ RUN curl -fsSL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_x.x | bash - && \
+    apt-get update && \
+    apt-get install -y nodejs

# ...

ENV MIX_ENV="prod"
+ ENV NODE_ENV="production"

In production, be sure to set NODE_ENV environment variable to production, so that the SSR script is cached for optimal performance.

Client side hydration

Follow the instructions from the Inertia.js docs for updating your client-side code to hydrate the pre-rendered HTML coming from the server.

Using our example React script from above, the adaptation looks like this:

  // assets/js/app.jsx

  import React from "react";
  import { createInertiaApp } from "@inertiajs/react";
- import { createRoot } from "react-dom/client";
+ import { hydrateRoot } from "react-dom/client";

  createInertiaApp({
    resolve: async (name) => {
      return await import(`./pages/${name}.jsx`);
    },
    setup({ App, el, props }) {
-     createRoot(el).render(<App {...props} />);
+     hydrateRoot(el, <App {...props} />);
    },
  });

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