First of all, thanks for that article; it was a big shortcut in evaluating at least some of the available modules. Yes, I did read it - I am subscribed to the Perl.com Newsletter so I think I got to see it very soon. :)

HTML::Template and TT2 made it through my preevaluation. The final decision was taken mainly with respect to the fact that the script I'm writing is intended to work on a system with a barebone Perl5 and no way to install modules - as is the case with many cheap web hosts. HTML::Template only consists of a sinlge .pm - TT2 is no competition in this case.

Well then. I embarked in working with HTML::Template. But the syntax is not well readable - <img src="<tmpl_var imgfile>"> is bulky, the tag doesn't visually stand out against a page full of template HTML, and using the brackets within a tag irks me. There is no special case to deal with newlines around the <tmpl_*> tags, so you can't put them on a line of their own if you want the output to look neat and tidy. And <tmpl_unless> can get very tiring to write dozen of times.

The templating module I want would offer powerful interpolation syntax but not a bit more power in highlevel constructs than necessary. It seems there currently is no way to get one without the other. HTML::Template actually is the opposite of what I need, it offers relatively powerful highlevel constructs but only a very limiting interpolation syntax unless you enable globals in which case you end up with even harder to read templates.

I should mention that the processing model I want to implement is (by the terminology of that article) a very strict pipeline architecture that allows logic in templates by cleanly separating it back into the code:

  1. fetch data, build list
  2. run filters over list to provide the template logic; variables get changed, added, deleted etc per record here
  3. interpolate data into template
All non-trivial modules I have seen try to integrate step 2 and 3 inside the template.

Now, you could say TT2 allows me to do it my way even if it offers more power than I want. But besides being awkward to use when you cannot install modules, to me it feels like "the tail wagging with the dog" as they say in Germany. Total overkill. I do not need a module that comes in 20-odd files incl XS, compiles my template to interpolate it, and can make coffee and bake cake to boot.

I was seriously about to go with CGI::FastTemplate - small, simple, clean concept written in a no-installation-required single Perl-only module. Except I had written something very similar myself for a previous (unspeakbly ugly) script and have come to despise the templatelet mess it reinforces. My only extra requirement beyond interpolation is just enough intelligence in the module so I don't end up with dozens of 30 byte template files.

Between my first reply and this one, you should have a very clear idea of what I want :) Say I wanted to modify an existing module rather than writing one from scratch. Where would you propose that I start?

In reply to Re^2: I am about to write my very own templating module.. by Aristotle
in thread I am about to write my very own templating module.. by Aristotle

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