Rails - Oct 2005 - Shared and owned templates/partials

Hi Railers!

I am trying to understand the logic of making shared templates  
override the normal ones.
For example, I would like to have a partial in my app which is called  
"toolbar".

In the "shared" toolbar I have:

# Some stuff
  * Change settings
  * Logout

In the specific toolbar (for instance in "foo/_toolbar") I have

# What to do with foos
  * Grok a foo
  * Make a foo
  * List foos
<%= render_partial ''shared/toolbar'' %>

As a bonus my layout (1 per app) would pick up it''s own toolbar(if it  
has one) or the shared toolbar - would be super-neat and also more  
predictable.

So why actually do shared templates override the normal ones (not the  
opposite - as I would think) and is it possible to change this  
behaviour somehow? (tinker with lookup order of ActionView).
-- 
Julian "Julik" Tarkhanov

Hi Julian,

I''m not sure if this is on-target for you, but in one of my projects  
we use the following code to over-ride the default behaviour by  
preferring controller-specific partials before defaulting to the  
"layouts" folder.  You could change it to default to the
''shared''
folder if you''d like:

class ActionView
   # Prefer controller-specific templates and partials if they exist.
   # Otherwise, use files in the layouts folder.
   class Base
     private
       def full_template_path(template_path, extension)
         # Prefer the controller-specific (regular) partial first
         preferred_path =
"#{@base_path}/#{template_path}.#{extension}"
         # Check to see if the partial exists in our layouts folder  
second
         secondary_path = ("#{@base_path}/layouts/# 
{template_path.split("/")[1]}.#{extension}" rescue
preferred_path)

         if File.exist?(preferred_path)
           preferred_path
         elsif File.exist?(secondary_path)
           secondary_path
         else
           # Even though the preferred file doesn''t exist, return it
           # so a reasonable error message can be given
           preferred_path
         end
       end
   end
end

On Oct 2, 2005, at 8:01 AM, Julian ''Julik'' Tarkhanov wrote:
> Hi Railers!
>
> I am trying to understand the logic of making shared templates  
> override the normal ones.
> For example, I would like to have a partial in my app which is  
> called "toolbar".
>
> In the "shared" toolbar I have:
>
> # Some stuff
>  * Change settings
>  * Logout
>
> In the specific toolbar (for instance in "foo/_toolbar") I have
>
> # What to do with foos
>  * Grok a foo
>  * Make a foo
>  * List foos
> <%= render_partial ''shared/toolbar'' %>
>
> As a bonus my layout (1 per app) would pick up it''s own toolbar(if
> it has one) or the shared toolbar - would be super-neat and also  
> more predictable.
>
> So why actually do shared templates override the normal ones (not  
> the opposite - as I would think) and is it possible to change this  
> behaviour somehow? (tinker with lookup order of ActionView).
> -- 
> Julian "Julik" Tarkhanov
>
> _______________________________________________
> Rails mailing list
> Rails-1W37MKcQCpIf0INCOvqR/iCwEArCW2h5@public.gmane.org
> http://lists.rubyonrails.org/mailman/listinfo/rails
>

On 3-okt-2005, at 16:37, Duane Johnson wrote:
> class ActionView
Right on the spot Duane! I tried diggingng into ActionView myself but  
it had like 25 methods for template lookup calling each other in no  
understandable order.

Modified to my needs this looks so:

module ActionView
   # Prefer controller-specific templates and partials if they exist.
   # Otherwise, use files in the layouts folder.
   class Base
     private
       def full_template_path(template_path, extension)
           # Prefer shared partial first (Rails default)
           shared_path = "#{@base_path}/#{template_path}.#{extension}"
         # Prefer the controller-specific (regular) partial second
         private_path = "#{@base_path}/#{template_path}.#{extension}"
         # Check to see if the partial exists in our "default" folder
last
         default_path = ("#{@base_path}/default/#{template_path.split 
("/")[1]}.#{extension}" rescue private_path)

         if File.exist?(shared_path)
           shared_path
         elsif File.exist?(private_path)
           private_path
         elsif File.exist?(default_path)
           default_path
         else
           # Even though the preferred file doesn''t exist, return it
           # so a reasonable error message can be given
           private_path
         end
       end
   end
end

This will use ''default'' directory under /views to lookup
missing
templates. Layouts is for layouts :-)
And yet it seems to me that using templates from ''shared'' as  
overrieds is incorrect.

-- 
Julian "Julik" Tarkhanov