Extensions still necessary for Github.io History Mode?

[suntong]

Reiterate the question at the bottom of https://dev.to/quasar/publish-your-quasar-spa-on-github-io-with-history-mode-20h2 --

anyone tried if this is still needed?
i think my page works without the hacks...

[manimovassagh]

Short answer: No, the 404.html hack is no longer necessary for most cases.

GitHub Pages now supports single-page application routing natively if you use a custom 404.html that redirects to your index. But more importantly, if you're deploying to a custom domain (not username.github.io/repo), history mode works out of the box because GitHub Pages serves index.html for any path that doesn't match a file.

For username.github.io/repo deployments (project pages), you still need the 404.html trick since GitHub doesn't do SPA fallback on subpaths. Here's the minimal setup:

1. Copy your dist/index.html to dist/404.html as part of your build:

// quasar.config.js
build: {
  afterBuild() {
    const fs = require("fs");
    fs.copyFileSync("dist/spa/index.html", "dist/spa/404.html");
  }
}

2. Set the correct publicPath in your quasar config:

build: {
  publicPath: "/your-repo-name/"
}

And set the base in your Vue Router config:

const Router = createRouter({
  history: createWebHistory("/your-repo-name/"),
  routes,
});

If you're using username.github.io as your root site (not a project subpath), then you don't need any of this — history mode just works.

The old redirect-via-JavaScript-in-404.html approach from that article is outdated. The 404.html copy approach is simpler and avoids the visible redirect flash.