Jeroen UbbinkandClaude Opus 4.8
6b1b4285fa
The ui/README.md was still stock create-next-app boilerplate. Replace it with the real story: the UI is a Next.js static export served by FastAPI from ui_out/, the two-process dev loop (backend :8000 + `make ui-dev` :3000 with hot reload, auto- targeting :8000), the build/integration commands, and the cross-origin CORS note. Also make the "ui_out not found" startup warning actionable — it now points to `make ui-build` / `make ui-dev` instead of silently saying it skipped serving. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Routstr node admin UI
A Next.js app (App Router, static export) that provides the
admin dashboard for a routstr-core node: login, settings, providers, balances,
transactions, usage, and logs.
There is no separate web server in production. next build produces a fully static
export (next.config.ts sets output: 'export'), and the FastAPI backend serves it
directly from ../ui_out/ (see routstr/core/main.py). So the UI and the API are
served from the same origin in production.
Developing the UI (hot reload)
The everyday loop runs two processes side by side — you do not rebuild the static export while developing:
- Start the backend on
:8000— from the repo root:make docker-up(oruvicorn routstr.core.main:app --reload). - Start the Next.js dev server on
:3000— from the repo root:make ui-dev(orcd ui && pnpm dev). Edits hot-reload instantly.
Open http://localhost:3000. With no NEXT_PUBLIC_API_URL set, the UI falls back to
http://127.0.0.1:8000 in development (see lib/api/services/configuration.ts), so it
talks to the local backend out of the box.
Because dev is cross-origin (:3000 → :8000), it relies on the backend's CORS
allowing the UI origin. The default cors_origins is ["*"]; if you tighten CORS,
keep http://localhost:3000 allowed for development.
Building the integrated/static UI (what production serves)
To produce the bundle that FastAPI serves from ../ui_out/:
make ui-build— builds with local Node/pnpm (scripts/build-ui.sh), then movesui/out/*to../ui_out/.make ui-build-docker— same, but inside Docker (no local Node needed).
NEXT_PUBLIC_* variables are read from the repo-root .env at build time and baked in.
For a same-origin deployment leave NEXT_PUBLIC_API_URL empty (relative paths); the UI
uses window.location.origin at runtime. After building, start the backend and open
http://localhost:8000 — the dashboard is served at / and /admin.
If ../ui_out/ does not exist, the backend logs a warning at startup and serves the API
only (hitting a UI route returns a small JSON fallback instead of the dashboard).