What happened to Laravel's redirectTo() method?

Question

We can override this property to redirect users after login in LoginController:

protected $redirectTo = '/home';

And here is the statement from documentation:

If the redirect path needs custom generation logic you may define a redirectTo method instead of a redirectTo property:

protected function redirectTo() {
// }

But it always redirects to '/home'; whatever the condition is.

protected function redirectTo()
{
  if (Auth::user()->role==0) {
    return '/volunteer';
  } else {
    return '/donor';
  }
}

If a method exists it'll use it, otherwise the property will be used. But it looks like property is being used even if the method exists.

However overriding authenticated() or sendLoginResponse() function works fine.

protected function authenticated()
    {
      if (Auth::user()->role==0) {
        return redirect('/volunteer') ;
      } else {
        return redirect('/donor');
      }
    }

What is wrong with redirectTo() method there? Here is the GitHub source code to these methods.

I'm using Laravel version 5.3.28.

Answer 1

This is the redirectPath() method in src/Illuminate/Foundation/Auth/RedirectsUsers.php in Laravel v5.3.28

public function redirectPath()
{
    return property_exists($this, 'redirectTo') ? $this->redirectTo : '/home';
}

In the later versions 5.3.29 and above. This was changed in file with commit:

Add auth redirect path generation method (#16896)

 public function redirectPath()
 {
     if (method_exists($this, 'redirectTo')) {
         return $this->redirectTo();
     }
     return property_exists($this, 'redirectTo') ? $this->redirectTo : '/home';
 }

So this part of documentation applies for Laravel version 5.3.29 and later only

If the redirect path needs custom generation logic you may define a redirectTo method instead of a redirectTo property:

protected function redirectTo() { // }

---

Solution for v5.3.28

To make redirectTo() method work in v5.3.28, manually add this in redirectPath() method in src/Illuminate/Foundation/Auth/RedirectsUsers.php.

if (method_exists($this, 'redirectTo')) {
    return $this->redirectTo();
}

Answer 2

Simple solution

Override redirectPath() instead of redirectTo().

Using raw string return:

protected function redirectPath()
{
  if (Auth::user()->role==0) {
    return '/volunteer';
  } else {
    return '/donor';
  }
}

Or overriding redirectPath() to the Laravel 5.3.29 redirectPath() version and then your redirectTo() method will work.

public function redirectPath()
{
  if (method_exists($this, 'redirectTo')) {
   return $this->redirectTo();
  }     
  return property_exists($this, 'redirectTo') ? $this->redirectTo : '/home';
}

Why redirectTo() is not working

Tested overriding the redirectPath() or redirectTo() method in App\Http\Controllers\Auth\LoginController.php on a clean Laravel v.5.3.29 + default Auth, they work as expected.

Example of redirectTo() method

Documentation says:

If the redirect path needs custom generation logic you may define a redirectTo method instead of a redirectTo property.

So, the function should look something like this:

protected function redirectTo()
{
    if(condition) {
      return "/your/path";
    } 
    return "/your/secondpath";
}

Answer 3

redirectTo redirects users that complete login or registration. Users who are already logged in and try to register or log in again will be redirected by app/Http/Middleware/RedirectIfAuthenticated.php

if (Auth::guard($guard)->check()) {
    return redirect('/home');
}

Answer 4

I think the issue comes from the web.php routes. I problem went away after I set the default '/' route to point to the login page.

Route::get('/', function () {
    return redirect(route('login'));
});