middleware.md

Middlewares

Middleware is a powerful feature in Laravel that sits between a request and a response, allowing you to filter and manipulate incoming requests before they reach your application's logic. This guide provides a general overview of middleware in Laravel and directs you to the official Laravel documentation for more detailed information.

What is Middleware?

Middleware acts as a series of filters that can modify, authenticate, or otherwise process an incoming HTTP request. It can intercept requests at different points of the application's request lifecycle and perform actions such as authentication, authorization, logging, and more.

Key Concepts

Middleware Groups

Middleware can be grouped together for convenience. For instance, you can create a middleware group that includes several authentication-related middleware. This allows you to apply a set of middleware to multiple routes at once.

Creating Middleware

You can create custom middleware using the artisan command-line tool. For example, to create a LogRequests middleware, you would run:

php artisan make:middleware LogRequests

This command generates a new middleware file in the app/Http/Middleware directory.

Applying Middleware

Middleware can be applied globally to all routes, to specific routes, or even to groups of routes. You can specify middleware in your route definitions or use the middleware method within a controller constructor.

Ordering Middleware

The order in which middleware is applied matters. Middleware applied earlier in the list will be executed before middleware applied later. You can control the order of execution by adjusting the order in which you add middleware to the Http/Kernel.php file.

Example

Here's a simple example to illustrate how middleware works:

// LogRequests.php (Middleware)

namespace App\Http\Middleware;

use Closure;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Log;

class LogRequests
{
    public function handle($request, Closure $next)
    {
        Log::info('Request received:', ['path' => $request->path()]);
        return $next($request);
    }
}

In this example, the LogRequests middleware logs information about incoming requests. It then passes the request to the next middleware or controller action in the pipeline.

Further Reading

This overview introduces the basic concepts of middleware in Laravel. To dive deeper into middleware, explore the official Laravel documentation on Middleware.

Laravel's official documentation provides comprehensive explanations, code examples, and best practices for working with middleware in your Laravel applications.