Re: When to use templates?

When to use templates? When programming a CGI, should you always use templates? When is not a good idea to use templates?

Reasons to use Templates

You can edit templates in a GUI
You can seperate code (and coders) from the art (and artists)
Lots of other reasons, explained in the other messages

Reasons NOT to use Templates

Keep everything in one file
Don't want to mess with modules
Writing very plain vanilla cgi with no decoration
Prototyping, so your script is very minimal
Even then I sometimes use a template that contains only a pre tag.

I use templates 95% of the time. Definitely a "best practice". My template of choice is HTML::Template because is it is so simple.

Cheers

--Fred

-------------------------------------
Nothing is too wonderful to be true
-- Michael Faraday

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Re^2: When to use templates? by revdiablo (Prior) on Nov 19, 2004 at 19:34 UTC
Keep everything in one file There is no reason a template has to be in an external file. With HTML::Template, you can embed your template into the `__DATA__` section, and pass `DATA` as the template filehandle. I do this often, and it works well. I'm sure other template modules have similar methods available. I tend to think of a template somewhat like a Perl module. Usually, it's cleaner and better to put these things in separate files. Sometimes, though, embedding them into the file where they're used is far simpler, while still retaining much of the benefit of using modules/templates in the first place.	[reply] [d/l] [select]

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Re^2: When to use templates?
by revdiablo (Prior) on Nov 19, 2004 at 19:34 UTC

Keep everything in one file

There is no reason a template has to be in an external file. With HTML::Template, you can embed your template into the __DATA__ section, and pass DATA as the template filehandle. I do this often, and it works well. I'm sure other template modules have similar methods available.

I tend to think of a template somewhat like a Perl module. Usually, it's cleaner and better to put these things in separate files. Sometimes, though, embedding them into the file where they're used is far simpler, while still retaining much of the benefit of using modules/templates in the first place.

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