The first step on the road to killing BML

[foxfirefey]

I've recently written a guide on Routing and Template Toolkit, which is the system that's going to be replacing BML. As is, the guide is probably only suitable for people who already know their way around the code fairly well, but it's a start to understanding the system if that's what you're interested in.

If you have questions, ask them here, so we can determine if they have answers that should be added to the guide or need solutions developed.

Learning this is especially relevant if you're doing anything that involves significantly revamping a given page, or creating a new page! It'd be better if it could be translated to this system instead of being done in BML.

Comments

[pauamma]

Hmm. I should probably read it and poke at the stats pages before they become too big.

[foxfirefey]

The overall picture is pretty easy, it's the details that niggle. Things I need to figure out, implement, or chase down people to implement:

* Redirects
* Cookies
* Crumbs, what is their deal now?
* Figure out a nohtml filter in TT, since I don't think there is one standard, but we can hook our functions for that in

And other things I'm sure I'll run into the more pages I attempt to translate.

[pauamma]

:goes read.

[pauamma]

OK, scanned through your draft guide, and it looks like the "convert existing page to TT" procedure would be something like:
- Move the complex perl to DW::Controller::Foo::foo_handler.
- Move the HTML and the simple(*) perl (translated to the TT embedded language) to foo.tt
- Move(**) the strings to foo.tt.text (or foo.tt.text-local).

Did I miss anything?

*: where "simple" is loosely defined as "what can be implemented in the TT embedded language".
**: Moved strings should probably have a |note attached pointing to the old string, to make rho's job easier.

[foxfirefey]

Only thing you missed is defining the URL!

Also, sidenote, if you leave the BML file in place, it'll barf all over the place.

[exor674]

Well, that's only an issue when you have different formats. But it needs to go away and die in a fire at some point so...

[pauamma]

Only thing you missed is defining the URL!

Hmm, yeah (since it's not defined implicitly by the path to the .tt template, unlike BML). Hmm, I wonder whether there's a way to link the URL to DW::Controller::Foo::foo_handler from within foo.tt instead of doing it from DW::Controller::Foo. (And if there is, should we use it?)

[afuna]

Hmmm, I don't think so. Or rather, I think that it's conceivable that one .tt file could be used in mulitple controllers, or that a controller could call multiple templates depending on certain conditions so I'd rather the controller do the registering, rather than the template.

[foxfirefey]

And some controllers don't even have templates, either, like ones that only do JSON.

exor674 has made a handy script, though, telling what controller something a path uses--that will probably help a lot.

[pauamma]

Hmm, yes, definitely not "instead". But now I'm thinking of the reverse case, several templates sharing a controller. (Possible use case: several posting template pages sharing the same backend, as suggested in http://dw-suggestions.dreamwidth.org/105294.htm.) I'm thinking that for those, it might be easier having the template register the controller. (Or it might not - I'm thinking aloud.)

Additionally, there's the reverse of what foxfirefey mentioned: is it possible for pages to be so simple that they need a template but no controller? (I'm thinking static or mostly-static pages.)

[exor674]

That's what the register_static ( currently broken, but will be fixed -- probably will tack it on to bug2282 ) is for.

register_static( '/path', 'some.tt', app => 1 );

And then just a single DW::Controller:<whatever> file for "static templates" (or throw it in ::Misc)

[pauamma]

I have a half-complete idea for an in-template interface to crumbs (and resources - like "I need this stylesheet and that javascript to work"). *wanders off to dw_dev to discuss*

[afuna]

For implementing filters, have you seen the implementation of ml in DW::Template::Apache2 yet? I was just poking around there for stuff I'm doing and realized that that part was already a dynamic filter(doh).

I was going to point you to the HTML plugin and then I realized that was still escaping and not stripping, so eh.