Manual template filling
Note
Filling the templates manually is not needed in a vast majority of common use cases and an automated process described before should be preferred.
The manual template filling process also requires a deeper knowledge of blockie and a description of all aspects of this process is beyond the current scope of this document. However, the examples in this chapter show some of the basic principles and further reading of the API and experimentation is encouraged.
The manual generation of content provides more low-level control over the way the data are being
filled into the template and allows to perform certain special operations that are otherwise not
possible. It relies on a manual execution of mainly the following Block methods
in a template filling script:
Block.get_subblock(): Loading a block from a template into theBlockobject.Block.set_variables(): Setting variable values.Block.set()andBlock.set_subblock(): Setting the content of blocks into the generated content.Block.clone(): Cloning the content of a block.Block.clear_variables(): Removing variable from the generated content.Block.clear()andBlock.clear_subblock(): Removing blocks from the generated content.
Examples
The following examples briefly illustrate the manual template filling process.
Example 1
template = """
SHOPPING LIST
Items Quantity
------------------------------------------------------------------------
<ITEMS>
* <FLAG>IMPORTANT! <^FLAG>MAYBE? </FLAG><ITEM><+> <QTY><UNIT> kg<^UNIT> l</UNIT>
</ITEMS>
"""
# flag, item, qty, unit
data = (
(-1, "apples", "1", 0),
(0, "potatoes", "2", 0),
(-1, "rice", "1", 0),
(-1, "orange juice", "1", 1),
(1, "cooking magazine", "", -1)
)
blk_template = blockie.Block(template)
blk_items = blk_template.get_subblock("items")
[blk_flag, blk_unit] = blk_items.get_subblock("flag", "unit")
for data_item in data:
blk_items.set_variables(item=data_item[1], qty=data_item[2])
blk_flag.set(data_item[0])
blk_unit.set(data_item[3])
blk_items.clone()
blk_items.set()
print(blk_template.content)
Generated content output:
SHOPPING LIST
Items Quantity
------------------------------------------------------------------------
* apples 1 kg
* IMPORTANT! potatoes 2 kg
* rice 1 kg
* orange juice 1 l
* MAYBE? cooking magazine
Example 2
template = """
SHOPPING LIST
Items Quantity
------------------------------------------------------------------------
<ITEMS>
* <ITEM><+> <QTY>
</ITEMS>
"""
# item, qty
data = (
("apples", "1 kg"),
("potatoes", "2 kg"),
("rice", "1 kg"),
("orange juice", "1 l"),
("cooking magazine", "")
)
blk_template = blockie.Block(template)
blk_items = blk_template.get_subblock("items")
for data_item in data:
blk_items.set_variables(autoclone=True, item=data_item[0], qty=data_item[1])
blk_items.set()
print(blk_template.content)
Generated content output:
SHOPPING LIST
Items Quantity
------------------------------------------------------------------------
* apples 1 kg
* potatoes 2 kg
* rice 1 kg
* orange juice 1 l
* cooking magazine
Example 3
template = """
SHOPPING LIST
Items Quantity
------------------------------------------------------------------------
<ITEMS>
* <ITEM><+> <QTY>
</ITEMS>
"""
data_item = ("apples", "potatoes", "rice", "orange juice", "cooking magazine")
data_qty = ("1 kg", "2 kg", "1 kg", "1 l", "")
blk_template = blockie.Block(template)
blk_items = blk_template.get_subblock("items")
blk_items.set_variables(item=data_item, qty=data_qty)
blk_items.set()
print(blk_template.content)
Generated content output:
SHOPPING LIST
Items Quantity
------------------------------------------------------------------------
* apples 1 kg
* potatoes 2 kg
* rice 1 kg
* orange juice 1 l
* cooking magazine