CGI::FormBuilder::Template - Template adapters for FormBuilder
# Define a template engine package CGI::FormBuilder::Template::Whatever; use base 'Whatever::Template::Module'; sub new { my $self = shift; my $class = ref($self) || $self; my %opt = @_; # override some options $opt{some_setting} = 0; $opt{another_var} = 'Some Value'; # instantiate the template engine $opt{engine} = Whatever::Template::Module->new(%opt); return bless \%opt, $class; } sub render { my $self = shift; my $form = shift; # only arg is form object # grab any manually-set template params my %tmplvar = $form->tmpl_param; # example template manipulation my $html = $self->{engine}->do_template(%tmplvar); return $html; # scalar HTML is returned }
This documentation describes the usage of FormBuilder templates, as well as how to write your own template adapter.
The template engines serve as adapters between CPAN template modules and FormBuilder. A template engine is invoked by using the template option to the top-level new() method:
template
new()
my $form = CGI::FormBuilder->new( template => 'filename.tmpl' );
This example points to a filename that contains an HTML::Template compatible template to use to layout the HTML. You can also specify the template option as a reference to a hash, allowing you to further customize the template processing options, or use other template engines.
HTML::Template
For example, you could turn on caching in HTML::Template with something like the following:
my $form = CGI::FormBuilder->new( fields => \@fields, template => { filename => 'form.tmpl', shared_cache => 1 } );
As mentioned, specifying a hashref allows you to use an alternate template processing system like the Template Toolkit. A minimal configuration would look like this:
Template Toolkit
my $form = CGI::FormBuilder->new( fields => \@fields, template => { type => 'TT2', # use Template Toolkit template => 'form.tmpl', }, );
The type option specifies the name of the engine. Currently accepted types are:
type
Builtin - Included, default rendering if no template specified Div - Render form using <div> (no tables) HTML - HTML::Template Text - Text::Template TT2 - Template Toolkit Fast - CGI::FastTemplate
In addition to one of these types, you can also specify a complete package name, in which case that module will be autoloaded and its new() and render() routines used. For example:
render()
my $form = CGI::FormBuilder->new( fields => \@fields, template => { type => 'My::Template::Module', template => 'form.tmpl', }, );
All other options besides type are passed to the constructor for that templating system verbatim, so you'll need to consult those docs to see what all the different options do. Skip down to "SEE ALSO".
In addition to the above included template engines, it is also possible to write your own rendering module. If you come up with something cool, please let the mailing list know!
To do so, you need to write a module which has a sub called render(). This sub will be called by FormBuilder when $form->render is called. This sub can do basically whatever it wants, the only thing it has to do is return a scalar string which is the HTML to print out.
$form->render
This is actually not hard. Here's a simple adapter which would manipulate an HTML::Template style template:
# This file is My/HTML/Template.pm package My::HTML::Template; use CGI::FormBuilder::Template::HTML; use base 'CGI::FormBuilder::Template::HTML'; sub render { my $self = shift; # class object my $form = shift; # $form as only argument # the template object (engine) lives here my $tmpl = $self->engine; # setup vars for our fields (objects) for ($form->field) { $tmpl->param($_ => $_->value); } # render output my $html = $tmpl->output; # return scalar; return $html; } 1; # close module
Then in FormBuilder:
use CGI::FormBuilder; use My::HTML::Template; # your module my $tmpl = My::HTML::Template->new; my $form = CGI::FormBuilder->new( fields => [qw(name email)], header => 1, template => $tmpl # pass template object ); # set our company from an extra CGI param my $co = $form->cgi_param('company'); $tmpl->engine->param(company => $co); # and render like normal print $form->render;
That's it! For more details, the best thing to do is look through the guts of one of the existing template engines and go from there.
CGI::FormBuilder, CGI::FormBuilder::Template::HTML, CGI::FormBuilder::Template::Text, CGI::FormBuilder::Template::TT2, CGI::FormBuilder::Template::Fast
$Id: Template.pm 100 2007-03-02 18:13:13Z nwiger $
Copyright (c) 2000-2006 Nate Wiger <nate@wiger.org>. All Rights Reserved.
This module is free software; you may copy this under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or the Artistic License, copies of which should have accompanied your Perl kit.
To install CGI::FormBuilder, copy and paste the appropriate command in to your terminal.
cpanm
cpanm CGI::FormBuilder
CPAN shell
perl -MCPAN -e shell install CGI::FormBuilder
For more information on module installation, please visit the detailed CPAN module installation guide.