Laravel 4 : Route returning wrong information - laravel

Question

I am setting up an API with Laravel so that I can connect with an AngularJS front-end.
I have 2 routes that go to the same controller method -> BallController#getSpecs
My routes are set up as follows:
Route::group(['prefix' => '/api/v1', 'before' => 'auth.basic'], function() {
Route::group(['prefix' => '/ball'], function() {
Route::get('/', 'BallController#getIndex');
Route::get('{id}', 'BallController#getIndex');
Route::get('specs', 'BallController#getSpecs');
Route::get('{id}/specs', 'BallController#getSpecs');
});
});
Now I am having trouble with Route::get('specs', 'BallController#getSpecs'); route.
The getSpecs method is defined as follows:
public function getSpecs($id = null)
{
if(empty($id))
{
Ball::all()->each(function($ball) {
$json = [$ball->id => [
'name' => $ball->name,
'core' => $ball->core->toArray(),
'coverstock' => $ball->coverstock->toArray(),
'finish' => $ball->finish->toArray(),
'manufacturer' => $ball->manufacturer->toArray()
]];
});
return Response::json($json);
}
else
{
$ball = Ball::find($id);
if(empty($ball))
{
return Response::json('You\'ve got no ballss', 404);
}
else
{
return Response::json([$ball->id => [
'name' => $ball->name,
'core' => $ball->core->toArray(),
'coverstock' => $ball->coverstock->toArray(),
'finish' => $ball->finish->toArray(),
'manufacturer' => $ball->manufacturer->toArray()
]]);
}
}
}
When I call /api/v1/ball/1/specs specifying an id I get the correct information back, however when I call /api/v1/ball/specs my function returns my error message 'You've got no balls'
ID should be null in this cast putting me into the first part of my if statement but for some reason I am getting into my else and getting my error because obviously no ID was provided and the ball won't exist.
Any help/insight will be appreciated.
Edit: I think it may be sending it to the wrong method. I think that /api/v1/ball/specs is being sent to BallController#getIndex instead of BallController#getSpecs.

Answer 1

The problem is in this part of the routing:
Route::get('{id}', 'BallController#getIndex');
Route::get('specs', 'BallController#getSpecs');
When it sees "/api/v1/ball/specs", it will actually call getIndex() with the "id" parameter set to "specs", because that's the first matching route. One way to fix it would be to define the "specs" route first before you define the "{id}" route. But a better solution would be to limit the accepted values of the "{id}" parmeter like this...
Route::get('{id}', 'BallController#getIndex')->where('id', '[0-9]+');
One other suggestion, there shouldn't be a leading "/" in your prefix values (apparently the code may be working anyway, but they aren't really supposed to be there. So the complete updated route might look like this...
Route::group(['prefix' => 'api/v1', 'before' => 'auth.basic'], function() {
Route::group(['prefix' => 'ball'], function() {
Route::get('/', 'BallController#getIndex');
Route::get('specs', 'BallController#getSpecs');
Route::get('{id}', 'BallController#getIndex')->where('id', '[0-9]+');
Route::get('{id}/specs', 'BallController#getSpecs')->where('id', '[0-9]+');
});
});