Problems with URL handling with Spring Boot and Angular 2 - url

Question

I am trying to develop an application with Spring Boot for the back end and Angular 2 for the front end, using maven.
The angular 2 front end is in the src/main/resources/static dir of the project.
When I enter the http://localhost:8080/ URL in my browser, all is fine: I can access the angular 2 front end, and the front end can communicate with the rest api perfectly. My angular 2 routing works fine: when I click on a link on the front end, I go the right page and the browser url bar shows the right things (ie. http://localhost:8080/documents)
But the problem is when I try to directly write the same URL in the browser. Spring take over the front end and says the is no mapping for /documents.
Is there a way to tell spring boot to only "listen" to /api/* URL and to "redirect" all the others to the front end?
Here is my Spring Controller class:
#RestController
#RequestMapping("/api")
public class MyRestController {
#Autowired
private DocumentsRepository documentRepository;
#CrossOrigin(origins = "*")
#RequestMapping(value = "/documents/list",
method = RequestMethod.GET,
produces = "application/json")
public Iterable<RfDoc> findAllDocuments() {
return documentRepository.findAll();
}
}
Here is the main application class:
#SpringBootApplication
public class Application {
public static void main(String[] args) {
SpringApplication.run(Application.class, args);
}
}
Here is my app.route.ts:
import { provideRouter, RouterConfig } from '#angular/router';
import { DocumentComponent } from './doc.component';
const routes: RouterConfig = [
{
path: '',
redirectTo: 'documents',
pathMatch: 'full'
},
{
path: "documents",
component: DocumentComponent
}
];
export const appRouterProviders = [
provideRouter(routes)
];

Answer 1

Ok, so I found a perfectly fine solution (for me, at least): I change my location for the old AngularJS 1.X way, with the # in the URL (i.e. http://localhost:8080/#/documents ).
To obtain this behaviour, I change my bootstrap like this
import { bootstrap } from '#angular/platform-browser-dynamic';
import { HTTP_PROVIDERS } from '#angular/http';
import { AppComponent } from './app.component';
import { appRouterProviders } from './app.routes';
import { AuthService } from './auth.service';
bootstrap(AppComponent, [AuthService,
appRouterProviders,
HTTP_PROVIDERS,
{ provide: LocationStrategy, useClass: HashLocationStrategy }
]);
Hope this can help somebody!