There are a couple of reasons why I avoid chaining routes.

1. There’s no added value having global configuration values in the URL path (e.g. lang). The best thing to do is to define these values in a separate configuration file.

2. Most frameworks are not very flexible when it comes to URL mapping, and there’s a good reason for that, routes give developers a good understanding of the system and speeds up the development time. If you have 40+ routes, the URL mapping configuration file becomes very difficult to understand and maintain.

3. It doesn’t allow you to customize the mapping process.

4. And, last but not least, just because it’s there doesn’t mean you have to use it :)

Oh, right, I skipped that part. I add it, so that when you visit / you get the /index/index/lang/en, not just /index/index, and when you visit something like /de, you don’t get a missing controller error.

it is unclear why you add $langroute too:
$router->addRoute(‘langRoute’, $langRoute);

«For what chains are for, is described in the manual, so I won’t be covering that :P»
The manual doesn’t do a good job on this, but your example makes it more clear.