electblake/mustache

CakePHP View Helper Plugin for the Mustache Templating Language

CakePHP (2.x) Mustache Plugin

Mustache View helper (originally CakePan) that renders Mustache templates. It will also load and process partials!, _(*1)

Why use Mustache templates in CakePHP?

Portability and scalability! If you have an app that uses lots of front-end coding, you only have to write your templates once. Mustache templates can be rendered in PHP, Javascript, Ruby, Scala, even C++! If you want to move to or from some other framework (Rails, Grails, Lithium etc.), you can be sure that your views and design won't have to be re-built., _(*2)

For scalability, when the time comes, you can use templates with a more powerful engine like Scala, or just send JSON from any source, and render with Javascript., _(*3)

Installation

1. From app directory - git submodule add git@github.com:electblake/CakePHP-Mustache-Plugin.git Plugin/Mustache

2. cd into Plugin/Mustache (so we can pull in the latest php implementation of mustache into Plugin/Mustache/Vendor)

3. git submodule init

4. git submodule update

If you want to add Mustache support globally, add it to your AppController, _(*4)

class AppController extends Controller {
    ...
    public $helpers = array('Mustache.Mustache');
    ...
}

Usage

See the Mustache manual: http://mustache.github.com/, _(*5)

Creating a Mustache Template

Your Mustache templates should all be in the /app/View/Elements/ directory, with a .mustache extension., _(*6)

/app/View/Elements/post.mustache, _(*7)

{{#Post}}
<h2>{{title}}</h2\>
<div>
    {{text}}
</div>
{{/Post}}

Rendering a Mustache Template

All the variable set by the controller are available, and merged with values passed into $params., _(*8)

$params = array(
    'title' => 'Show me the bacon!',
    'text' => 'Bacon ipsum dolor sit amet fatback pig swine...'
);

$this->Mustache->render('template_name', $params)

Using Partials

Partials should follow the same naming convention. Mustache will pass the variables to the partial in the context that it's called. For example, a nested template for a blog post with comments might look like:, _(*9)

/app/View/Elements/posts/post.mustache:, _(*10)

{{#Post}}
<h2>{{title}}</h2\>
<div>
    {{text}}
</div>
{{/Post}}
{{#Comment}}
    {{>post/comment}}
{{/Comment}}

/app/View/Elements/posts/comment.mustache:, _(*11)

<div>
<h3>{{#User}}{{name}}{{/User}} said: </h3>
<p>{{text}}</p>
</div>