I use something similar to this with mod_perl to flash using xml.
Flash then uses xml in a template fashion. Our templates are
highly configurable this way.
In the near future we will be doing it as mod_perl to ajax.
Unfortunately we haven't decided on how we want to make
our code public yet. Maybe in the near future...
When we have it doing ajax output, the template mechanisms
will become a lot more visible via javascript.
The nice thing about doing this way is off loading some of the
processing onto the client.
Boysenberry
boysenberrys.com | habitatlife.com | selfgnosis.com
On Dec 26, 2005, at 10:26 AM, Frank Wiles wrote:
On Mon, 26 Dec 2005 14:17:00 +0100
Joachim Zobel <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
I think it makes sense to use Apache filtering to seperate the
presentation layer. The idea is to have an application layer that
outputs xml and a template engine attached by filtering that merges
the xml into html pages.
What is already there? Are there any template engines that can be
attached through filtering? Is there any spec. for an interface xml?
What are the cons of this approach?
Separating your application like that is a great idea, most large
applications do this type of separation inside of the app itself.
While I haven't heard of anyone doing this in practice, I have at
times thought about it.
It would be fairly trivial to write a filter that takes XML input
and rework it so that it can be passed into a templating engine like
Template Toolkit.
The only real drawback is that you've got the extra encode/decode
cycle going on. Assuming you gather your data into some complex
data structure, convert it to XML and then output it. You then
have to convert the XML back into a perl data structure and then
pass it to the template engine. This could cause significant
performance problems depending on your hardware/traffic.
If your app interfaces with a lot of various applications, uses
REST/SOAP/XML-RPC, etc. extensively then it might be more worthwhile
to do this, allowing you to completely separate your "internal"
logic/data from the outside world.
Another option entirely is using XSLT to do your transformation
between XML and HTML. There is a plugin for Template Toolkit for
this even.
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Frank Wiles <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
http://www.wiles.org
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