The template directive is supplied by the [[!iki plugins/template desc=template]] plugin.

The template directive allows wiki pages to be used as templates. These templates can be filled out and inserted into other pages in the wiki using the directive. The templates page lists templates that can be used with this directive.

The directive has an id parameter that identifies the template to use. The remaining parameters are used to fill out the template.

Example

[[!template  id=note text="""Here is the text to insert into my note."""]]

This fills out the note template, filling in the text field with the specified value, and inserts the result into the page.

Using a template

Generally, a value can include any markup that would be allowed in the wiki page outside the template. Triple-quoting the value even allows quotes to be included in it. Combined with multi-line quoted values, this allows for large chunks of marked up text to be embedded into a template:

    [[!template  id=foo name="Sally" color="green" age=8 notes="""
    * [[Charley]]'s sister.
    * "I want to be an astronaut when I grow up."
    * Really 8 and a half.
    """]]

Creating a template

The template is in a regular wiki page, located in the templates/ subdirectory inside the source directory of the wiki. The contents of the templatebody directive are used as the template. Anything outside that directive is not included in the template, and is usually used as documentation describing the template.

If the template does not contain a templatebody directive, the entire source of the page is used for the template. This is deprecated, because it leads to the template markup being interpreted as ordinary page source when the page is built, as well as being used as the template.

Alternatively, templates can be stored in a directory outside the wiki, as files with the extension ".tmpl". By default, these are searched for in /usr/share/ikiwiki/templates, the templatedir setting can be used to make another directory be searched first. When referring to templates outside the wiki source directory, the "id" parameter is not interpreted as a pagespec, you must include the full filename of the template page including the ".tmpl" extension, and the templatebody directive is not used. E.g.:

[[!template  id=blogpost.tmpl]]

The template uses the syntax used by the [[!cpan HTML::Template]] perl module, which allows for some fairly complex things to be done. Consult its documentation for the full syntax, but all you really need to know are a few things:

• Each parameter you pass to the template directive will generate a template variable. There are also some pre-defined variables like PAGE and BASENAME.
• To insert the value of a variable, use <TMPL_VAR variable>. Wiki markup in the value will first be converted to html.
• To insert the raw value of a variable, with wiki markup not yet converted to html, use <TMPL_VAR raw_variable>.
• To make a block of text conditional on a variable being set use <TMPL_IF variable>text</TMPL_IF>.
• To use one block of text if a variable is set and a second if it's not, use <TMPL_IF variable>text<TMPL_ELSE>other text</TMPL_IF>

Here's a sample template:

    [[!templatebody  <<ENDBODY
    <span class="infobox">
    Name: [[<TMPL_VAR raw_name>]]<br />
    Age: <TMPL_VAR age><br />
    <TMPL_IF color>
    Favorite color: <TMPL_VAR color><br />
    <TMPL_ELSE>
    No favorite color.<br />
    </TMPL_IF>
    <TMPL_IF notes>
    <hr />
    <TMPL_VAR notes>
    </TMPL_IF>
    </span>
    ENDBODY]]

This template describes a person. Parameters: name, age,
color (favorite color, optional), notes (optional).

The filled out template will be formatted the same as the rest of the page that contains it, so you can include WikiLinks and all other forms of wiki markup in the template. Note though that such WikiLinks will not show up as backlinks to the page that uses the template.

Note the use of "raw_name" inside the WikiLink generator in the example above. This ensures that if the name contains something that might be mistaken for wiki markup, it's not converted to html before being processed as a WikiLink.

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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.



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