HTML::Template

Item Description: A great module for creating HTML templates.

Review Synopsis:

We hear about it all the time, and most, if not all of us have dabbled in it at one time. You know what I speak of, Dynamic web content. Well, if you prefer, or are required to use a template system, might I suggest giving HTML::Template a go. Some may ask my main reason for endorsing it, to which I would respond with simplicity, and flexibility. Hands down, HTML::Template gotta be the simplest way to manage templates. Lets give an example.

Taken from the CPAN docs HTML::Template:

Create a simple HTML page, with two template variables HOME and PATH, name it test.tmpl.
We will fill the variables with data below.

  <html>
  <head><title>Test Template</title>
  <body>
  My Home Directory is <TMPL_VAR NAME=HOME>
  <p>
  My Path is set to <TMPL_VAR NAME=PATH>
  </body>
  </html>
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Now, lets build a program to fill in those previously named variables. The result is displayed below

  #!/usr/bin/perl -w
  use HTML::Template;

  # open the html template
  my $template = HTML::Template->new(filename => 'test.tmpl');

  # fill in some parameters
  $template->param(HOME => $ENV{HOME});
  $template->param(PATH => $ENV{PATH});

  # send the obligatory Content-Type and print the template output
  print "Content-Type: text/html\n\n", $template->output;
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Make sure its all ready to go, then point your browser to the script you just created, now, you should have output that looks kinda like this:

  My Home Directory is /home/some/directory
  My Path is set to /bin;/usr/bin
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Simple, no?

It Gets Better

Not only does it support simple variables, you can also:

Escape HTML from your data!

Set default values, if data is not supplied by param!

Build Loops!

Include other templates!

Build Conditionals!

Error handling has descriptive error output, which speeds up debugging!

And much more!

I'm not going into much more detail here, I like to keep it simple, just know that I have found it useful. Paired with CGI, DBD::mysql, CGI::Session, and various others, I've been able to create powerful web applications. Another note, I feel that the module is newbie friendly, as I myself is a newb ;-). Further info can be found on CPAN, and the docs are very easy to read. So far, I have no displeasures with this module, please, reply with your opinions.

Thanks,

DeFyance