Smarty Anyone?

Not sure that’s such a good idea. WordPress has it’s own templating system, so you’d be effectively using a template engine to design a theme for a templating system, yes? OTT? 🙂

If you’re used to Smarty, WP should be a snip to use. Start with http://codex.wordpress.org/Theme_Development
and then bookmark http://codex.wordpress.org/index.php?title=Template_Tags

Looking at the example on the smarty site i’d say i’d disagree it’s any easier, you’d still have to learn a new syntax if you’re a non-coder…

To anyone who knows HTML and CSS, but not PHP this..
{foreach from=$data item="entry"}
[one snippet from the example on the smarty site]

makes no more sense then a PHP equivalent to a user not familiar with the syntax..

WordPress templates are written in CSS, HTML and PHP, there’s nothing more to it, other then calling a function here and there, but the syntax is the same as you’d use for regular PHP, no special syntax, unlike the smarty code..

I’m trying to look at this with a non-bias approach but having a hard time because i can write PHP, HTML and CSS and can’t see how Smarty could offer me anything that i can’t do already… you’ll have to sell me on it with something a bit more…

If you know HTML and CSS, you can write templates in WordPress just as easily as in Smarty (i’d be willing to argue easier), because there’s still additional syntax in the files that require understanding… whether that be PHP or Smarty code is apples for oranges… personally i think the syntax looks horrible and i’d rather stick with regular style PHP, not some special syntax.

Don’t let my comment be a turn off for anyone though, compare the difference between the two types.. (i’ll have to make imaginary equivalents for the PHP example)

Smarty:

{* Smarty *}

<form action="{$SCRIPT_NAME}?action=submit" method="post">
<table border="1">
    {if $error ne ""}
        <tr>
            <td bgcolor="yellow" colspan="2">
                {if $error eq "name_empty"}You must supply a name.
                {elseif $error eq "comment_empty"} You must supply a comment.
                {/if}
            </td>
        </tr>
    {/if}
    <tr>
        <td>Name:</td>
        <td><input type="text" name="Name" value="{$post.Name|escape}" size="40"></td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td valign="top">Comment:</td>
        <td><textarea name="Comment" cols="40" rows="10">{$post.Comment|escape}</textarea></td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td colspan="2" align="center"><input type="submit" value="Submit"></td>
    </tr>
</table>
</form>

PHP equivalent:

<?php get_header(); // If this page required the include for the header ?>
<form action="<?php bloginfo('url'); // Depends what you're doing ?>" method="post">
<table border="1">
<?php if($error) { ?>
        <tr>
            <td bgcolor="yellow" colspan="2">
                <?php echo $error; ?>
            </td>
        </tr>
   <?php } ?>
    <tr>
        <td>Name:</td>
        <td><input type="text" name="Name" value="<?php echo $somevar['name']; ?>" size="40"></td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td valign="top">Comment:</td>
        <td><textarea name="Comment" cols="40" rows="10"><?php echo $somevar['comment']; ?></textarea></td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td colspan="2" align="center"><input type="submit" value="Submit"></td>
    </tr>
</table>
</form>
<?php get_footer(); // If we're calling the header, then we likely want the footer to ?>

By all means if i’m missing something point it out, i just thought your point was the WP templating system is hard to use(or even in comparison), which could not be further from the truth (impo), i’ve used a a few CMS systems over the years, including PHPNuke (i know shocking), DragonflyCMS (formerly CPGNuke) and a few others, and none of them were as easy and friendly to use as the WordPress templating system..

p.s. Where’s my free smarties?… 🙁 … the thread title had me thinking of chocolate…

Chaos, hmmm… i don’t know about that, the reason i came to WordPress was partly due to it’s ease of use..

If you’re use to the Smarty syntax, then naturally having to switch to PHP escapes would seem like chaos…

You can click on my profile link and see how long i’ve been using WordPress (since earlier this year), so i’m no expert, i’ve just picked it up fairly fast in that time (or at least i feel i’ve picked up quite alot).

{$QuoteStyle}

How is that no different then an escape sequence?… will smarty render that correctly if it were..

{$QuoteStyle

If not, then it’s no different then remembering..

<?php ?>

over..

{ }

You still ultimately end up with some enclosing characters for the commands, and you still have a set of them to remember, but obviously under a different syntax.

I’ll agree yes it looks less threatening and easier, but i’d still opt for recommending PHP because you can carry across PHP know-how to so many more places, more places then you’d be able to use Smarty.

Learning PHP would not only allow more control over your templates, but also give insight in how to write applications or scripts (and help you grasp ones you’re using already), learning Smarty just teachs you how to write Smarty, that’s only going to carry across to other “Smarty enabled apps”, and i’d guess that’s a far less number then apps that utilise PHP..

I’ll also agree it’s possibly an easier learning curve in some cases with Smarty, but like i said where can you carry that understanding along to utilise elsewhere when compared with PHP?..