Smarty

[devnul]

Hello,

I have a template (call it "menu_bar.tpl"), which is basically a table with

[boots]

hey devnul:

Interesting idea, though in my mind, the implemention is at the wrong point. I guess I'm not a big fan of rewriting output where there are clear ways of getting the proper content written in the first place.

Your desire not to touch the menu source is a bit limiting, but it occurs to me that you can implement your toggle_menu functionality as a plugin fucntion. Then instead of {include file="menu.tpl"}, you would do something like {include_menu file="menu.tpl"}. Same functionality and it leaves it to the designer where the sticky funcitonality is applied. Or you can implement it inside a block function (say {sticky_menu} .. {/sticky_menu}) which you would wrap around the menu code (yes, introduces some Smarty into the template, but then keeps related features together).

Still, I would think that the ideal solution would be to create some sort of custom link plugin function that automatically generates the required code for each link instead of having to manually produce the onmouseover (and other stuff) code for each link.

2c.

[devnul]

Yes I see your point - I did forget to mention one other point though that might change your view... I use GoLive as my primary HTML design tool (just got tired of coding everything in vi and GoLive actually writes pretty solid HTML).. If I implement it as a plugin then I can't visually see what is going on... Seeing what is going on is very important because of the integration of GoLive and Photoshop/Illustrator... With the combination of these I can design a button one time and simply assign variables to it within GoLive... if I ever update the look of the button all my menu bars get the new look without any effort...

Also, I don't use the { include } method.. I actually have reconfigured the delimiters and have them just do <!--{$menu}--> and the class actually does a "fetch" on the template then assign_ref's it to menu... It's interesting, everytime I got ready to write Smarty code {if}/etc in the HTML I stepped back from it a few feet and thought of a way to put that logic in the class.. Usually I'd end up with an extra HTML file to generate, but it's worked out fine.. As an example, I have one menu bar which is displayed when the user is logged in and another when they are not.. So yeah there are two html files to edit/maintain, but it has allowed me to truly look at each issue (design/business logic) completely seperately...

I do realize that writing a template with {if}/etc tags in it would be pretty straightforward and that any designer could just {include} it where they wanted it.... But, what I am after here is a method which would allow the designer to rig up whatever kind of menu scheme/design they want and still give them the sticky functionality.... For a Smarty/PHP person this is pretty straightforward, for a graphics artist turned web designer it's a different matter entirely.... It seems like doing it this way the possibility of a designer breaking it is minimized (as long as there is a "_over" and a "_base" graphic the code should always work -at least I'm hoping that will be the case)...

The issue, of course, is by using a plugin/registered function (I reckon they both do about the same thing) is that I can't see what it actually is going to look like... Neither could my customers.. I like the idea of being able to tell my customers "You want a new menu bar.. No problem.. Just design it and upload it.."... I may have them put some extra attribute on it like '<img src="blah_base.gif" over="blah_over.gif" sticky="yes">', but I still can't decide if this whole thing is even a good idea... I flip-flop on it about every 5 minutes it seems like...

Does that change your thoughts on this (I.E. being able to visually design the HTML)... Or are you still thinking that a different approach is warranted here?..

I also did a performance test, something like: