Partials as an Option

[bigorangemachine]

Hi,
Thanks for the great work on express-handlebars.

I'm a little new to Node/Express/Handlebars but I have lots of javascript experience.

I'm trying to experiment and see if I can change a partial when you do a res.render()

My 'Main()' node script

//declare statics
var TPL_DIR=__dirname+'/'+'handlebars_tpl/',
    TPL_PRTLS='partials/',
    TPL_LYT='layouts/',
    TPL_DEFAULT=TPL_DIR+TPL_LYT+'base.html';
//declare locals
var express = require('./node_modules/express'),
    _ = require('./node_modules/underscore'),
    exphbs = require('./node_modules/express-handlebars'),//some call this exphbs
    app = express(),
    hbs = exphbs.create({'extname':'html', 'defaultLayout':TPL_DEFAULT,'layoutsDir':TPL_DIR+TPL_LYT,'partialsDir':TPL_DIR+TPL_PRTLS});

//declare globals (utilities)
global.bdUtls = require('./utls/bd');
global.HandleBars = require('./node_modules/handlebars');
global.exphbs = exphbs;
global.hbs = hbs;
global.page_vars={
    'db_obj':false,
    'assets_url':'',
    'base_url':''
};

//set global methods
app.set('views', TPL_DIR+TPL_LYT);
app.engine('.html', hbs.engine);
app.set('view engine', '.html');
app.all('*', function(req, res, next){//always do this
    global.page_vars.base_url=req.protocol + '://' + req.get('host') + req.originalUrl;
    var env = process.env.NODE_ENV || 'default', cfg = require('./config/'+env);
    global.page_vars.assets_url='//'+global.bdUtls.url_chomp(cfg.assets_url);//remove https:// http:// or //
    _.extend(hbs.helpers,{//new helpers!
        'page_vars':global.page_vars,
        'assets_url':global.page_vars.assets_url
    });

    next();//this is required or it hangs!  This allows other 'routes' to happen
});

//express stuff for routing
app.listen(8080,function(){//on start
    //process.stdout.write("\u001B[2J\u001B[0;0f");//clear console
    console.log('listening to port: 8080');
});
var demo_routes = require('./hello.world');
app.get('/', demo_routes.action);
app.get('/hello(\.|\/)world', demo_routes.action);
app.post('/hello(\.|\/)world', demo_routes.action);//POST!

My Router Rule (hello.world):

var demo_route_func=function(req,res) {
    //res.render('home');
console.log(global.hbs);
    res.render('hello.world.html',{'helpers':{'debug_output':new global.HandleBars.SafeString('<p>test</p>')},'partials':{'footer':'altfooter.html','header':'altheader.html'}});
    //res.send('Hello Bold New World');
};
exports.action = demo_route_func;

Is this:

res.render('hello.world.html',{'helpers':{'debug_output':new global.HandleBars.SafeString('<p>test</p>')},'partials':{'footer':'altfooter.html','header':'altfooter.html'}});

setup to work or am I doing it wrong? It finds the partial 'header' or 'footer' correctly. It seems you can't switch the partial when you flip the 'render'. Maybe its my n00bness to handlebars but I thought you could do pass the partials as an argument or option.

[ericf]

That feature is currently not supported. Right now you must configure the dirs where your partials are up front.

Stepping back, what are you trying to accomplish with having a dynamic partial? There might be a different way of accomplishing what you're trying to do. And in the meantime, I'll think through how I could add support for passing in partials to res.render().

[ericf]

I want to figure out how Handlebars behaves when you use registerPartial(), but also render a template passing {partials: {...}} as the options argument.

[bigorangemachine]

Eric,
Thanks for your reply.

I am experimenting. I am trying to figure out which features overlap or if I could hack it :p

I am new to handlebars to so there was confusion around other issues I resolved. This was the only problem I couldn't resolve because changing the core handlebars code didn't give me debugging info I was trying to get.

I went through the express-handlebars code and I saw everything was populating correctly. In a weird way I am happy that it wasn't me.

Thanks again Eric