django-clearplaintext 1.0.2

Django template filter for cleaning up whitespace in plain text

django-clearplaintext

Provides a Django template filter that normalizes plain text while allowing explicit whitespace control.

It collapses excessive whitespace but preserves intentional formatting using escaped sequences like \n, \t, and \s.

Perfect for:

• Plain text emails
• Notification templates
• Text exports
• System messages
• Markdown templates
• Structured text blocks inside Django templates

✨ What It Does

The clean_plaintext filter:

• Collapses multiple spaces into a single space

• Limits consecutive blank lines to a maximum of two

• Strips leading and trailing whitespace on each line

• Removes empty lines at the beginning and end

• Converts escaped sequences:

  • \n → newline
  • \t → tab
  • \s → single space

This allows you to write readable Django templates while still controlling whitespace precisely.

📦 Installation

pip install django-clearplaintext

🔧 Setup

Add it to your Django project:

INSTALLED_APPS = [
    ...
    "clearplaintext",
]

🚀 Usage

Input

Load the template tag:

{% load clearplaintext_filters %}

Use it as a filter block:

{% filter clean_plaintext %}
Hello {{ user.get_full_name }},\n

Your order has been confirmed.\n
{% for item in order.items %}
    \t- {{ item.name }} ({{ item.quantity }}x)\n
    {% if not forloop.last %}\n{% endif %}
{% endfor %}

Best regards,\n
{{ company.name }}
{% endfilter %}

Output

Hello John Smith,

Your order has been confirmed.
Items:
    - Widget (2x)
    - Gadget (1x)

Best regards,
Acme Inc.

🎯 Why Use This?

Django templates often produce messy whitespace because of:

• Template indentation
• Conditionals and loops
• Readability formatting
• Multi-line template blocks

This filter lets you:

• Keep templates readable
• Avoid ugly output formatting
• Still control exact whitespace when needed

It is especially useful for plain-text emails where formatting matters.

🧠 Design Philosophy

• Minimal
• No external dependencies
• Focused on plain text formatting
• Safe and predictable behavior
• Suitable for reusable Django apps

🔍 Escaped Sequences Supported

Sequence	Result
\n	Newline
\t	Tab
\s	Single space

Escaped sequences are protected during normalization and restored afterward.

🧪 Testing

The package is tested against multiple Django versions using tox.

To run tests locally:

tox

📄 License

MIT License