repoze.bfg.skins 0.5

Skin templates for repoze.bfg

repoze.bfg.skins provides a framework to register file-system page templates (ZPT) as components; we’ll refer to these templates as “skin templates”.

Templates registered using this framework double as template macros in the sense that a mechanism is exposed to easily look up and render a skin template as a macro from inside a template.

Package configuration

Within your repoze.bfg application package, include the ZCML configuration by adding the following statement to your project’s configure.zcml file:

<include package="repoze.bfg.skins" file="meta.zcml"/>

Registering templates

Once you’ve included the repoze.bfg.skins ZCML, you may use the ZCML directive <bfg:templates> to register a directory with templates and make them available as view components, complete with security and adaptation:

<bfg:templates
   directory="templates"/>

The directory parameter indicates a package-relative path that should point at a filesystem directory containing chameleon.zpt templates with the extension .pt. Each template located inside the directory (recursively) becomes a component with a name based on the relative path to the template file (minus the extension, directory separators are replaced with a dot).

Note that templates will only be available as traversable views if you explicitly name the IView interface:

<bfg:templates
   provides="repoze.bfg.interfaces.IView"
   directory="templates"/>

Skin template components are callables and return a WSGI response object (like all repoze.bfg views).

You can override which “request type” the skin is for by using the request_type attribute:

<bfg:templates
   request_type="mypackage.interfaces.MyRequestType"
   directory="templates"/>

See the repoze.bfg view request type documentation for more information on request types.

If you want to protect your templates with a specific permission, you may as well by using the permission directive:

<bfg:templates
   permission="view"
   directory="templates"/>

If you want the templates to only be displayed for specific context (model) types, use the for parameter:

<bfg:templates
   for="myproject.models.MyModel"
   directory="templates"/>

The provides, request_type, permission`, and ``for parameters are all optional.

Macro support

Templates are also available as METAL macros using the function get_macro which is available from the template symbol to all skin templates.

The template symbol is tied to the current context and request. The usage of the macros object is demonstrated below:

<div metal:use-macro="template.get_macro('thumbnail')" />
<div metal:use-macro="template.get_macro('thumbnail', context)" />

A more elaborate example demonstrating macro slot support:

<div metal:use-macro="template.get_macro('thumbnail')">
   <span metal:fill-slot="label">
      This is a thumbnail
   <span>
</div>

Providing custom skin APIs

Helper utilities can be registered as skin apis and pulled in using the utility function get_api, which is available from the template symbol.

They must be registered as named component providing the ISkinApi interface, adapting on (context, request, template). A base class is provide for convenience:

>>> from repoze.bfg.skins.template import SkinApi

To look up a template API, simply use attribute-access on the api symbol.

<div tal:define=”api template.get_api(‘custom’)” />

Automatic detection of new template files

When the global configuration option auto_reload is set to “true”, skin templates are found at run-time.

Contributors

Malthe Borch <[e-mail]> Stefan Eletzhofer <[e-mail]>

To contribute to development or get support, please visit the #repoze channel on freenode irc or write the mailinglist.