NAME¶
Template::Tools::ttree - Process entire directory trees of templates
SYNOPSIS¶
ttree [options] [files]
DESCRIPTION¶
The
ttree script is used to process entire directory trees containing
template files. The resulting output from processing each file is then written
to a corresponding file in a destination directory. The script compares the
modification times of source and destination files (where they already exist)
and processes only those files that have been modified. In other words, it is
the equivalent of 'make' for the Template Toolkit.
It supports a number of options which can be used to configure behaviour, define
locations and set Template Toolkit options. The script first reads the
.ttreerc configuration file in the HOME directory, or an alternative
file specified in the TTREERC environment variable. Then, it processes any
command line arguments, including any additional configuration files specified
via the "-f" (file) option.
The .ttreerc Configuration File¶
When you run
ttree for the first time it will ask you if you want it to
create a
.ttreerc file for you. This will be created in your home
directory.
$ ttree
Do you want me to create a sample '.ttreerc' file for you?
(file: /home/abw/.ttreerc) [y/n]: y
/home/abw/.ttreerc created. Please edit accordingly and re-run ttree
The purpose of this file is to set any
global configuration options that
you want applied
every time
ttree is run. For example, you can
use the "ignore" and "copy" option to provide regular
expressions that specify which files should be ignored and which should be
copied rather than being processed as templates. You may also want to set
flags like "verbose" and "recurse" according to your
preference.
A minimal
.ttreerc:
# ignore these files
ignore = \b(CVS|RCS)\b
ignore = ^#
ignore = ~$
# copy these files
copy = \.(gif|png|jpg|pdf)$
# recurse into directories
recurse
# provide info about what's going on
verbose
In most cases, you'll want to create a different
ttree configuration file
for each project you're working on. The "cfg" option allows you to
specify a directory where
ttree can find further configuration files.
cfg = /home/abw/.ttree
The "-f" command line option can be used to specify which
configuration file should be used. You can specify a filename using an
absolute or relative path:
$ ttree -f /home/abw/web/example/etc/ttree.cfg
$ ttree -f ./etc/ttree.cfg
$ ttree -f ../etc/ttree.cfg
If the configuration file does not begin with "/" or "." or
something that looks like a MS-DOS absolute path (e.g.
"C:\\etc\\ttree.cfg") then
ttree will look for it in the
directory specified by the "cfg" option.
$ ttree -f test1 # /home/abw/.ttree/test1
The "cfg" option can only be used in the
.ttreerc file. All the
other options can be used in the
.ttreerc or any other
ttree
configuration file. They can all also be specified as command line options.
Remember that
.ttreerc is always processed
before any
configuration file specified with the "-f" option. Certain options
like "lib" can be used any number of times and accumulate their
values.
For example, consider the following configuration files:
/home/abw/.ttreerc:
cfg = /home/abw/.ttree
lib = /usr/local/tt2/templates
/home/abw/.ttree/myconfig:
lib = /home/abw/web/example/templates/lib
When
ttree is invoked as follows:
$ ttree -f myconfig
the "lib" option will be set to the following directories:
/usr/local/tt2/templates
/home/abw/web/example/templates/lib
Any templates located under
/usr/local/tt2/templates will be used in
preference to those located under
/home/abw/web/example/templates/lib.
This may be what you want, but then again, it might not. For this reason, it
is good practice to keep the
.ttreerc as simple as possible and use
different configuration files for each
ttree project.
Directory Options¶
The "src" option is used to define the directory containing the source
templates to be processed. It can be provided as a command line option or in a
configuration file as shown here:
src = /home/abw/web/example/templates/src
Each template in this directory typically corresponds to a single web page or
other document.
The "dest" option is used to specify the destination directory for the
generated output.
dest = /home/abw/web/example/html
The "lib" option is used to define one or more directories containing
additional library templates. These templates are not documents in their own
right and typically comprise of smaller, modular components like headers,
footers and menus that are incorporated into pages templates.
lib = /home/abw/web/example/templates/lib
lib = /usr/local/tt2/templates
The "lib" option can be used repeatedly to add further directories to
the search path.
A list of templates can be passed to
ttree as command line arguments.
$ ttree foo.html bar.html
It looks for these templates in the "src" directory and processes them
through the Template Toolkit, using any additional template components from
the "lib" directories. The generated output is then written to the
corresponding file in the "dest" directory.
If
ttree is invoked without explicitly specifying any templates to be
processed then it will process every file in the "src" directory. If
the "-r" (recurse) option is set then it will additionally iterate
down through sub-directories and process and other template files it finds
therein.
$ ttree -r
If a template has been processed previously,
ttree will compare the
modification times of the source and destination files. If the source template
(or one it is dependant on) has not been modified more recently than the
generated output file then
ttree will not process it. The
-a
(all) option can be used to force
ttree to process all files regardless
of modification time.
$ tree -a
Any templates explicitly named as command line argument are always processed and
the modification time checking is bypassed.
File Options¶
The "ignore", "copy" and "accept" options are used
to specify Perl regexen to filter file names. Files that match any of the
"ignore" options will not be processed. Remaining files that match
any of the "copy" regexen will be copied to the destination
directory. Remaining files that then match any of the "accept"
criteria are then processed via the Template Toolkit. If no "accept"
parameter is specified then all files will be accepted for processing if not
already copied or ignored.
# ignore these files
ignore = \b(CVS|RCS)\b
ignore = ^#
ignore = ~$
# copy these files
copy = \.(gif|png|jpg|pdf)$
# accept only .tt2 templates
accept = \.tt2$
The "suffix" option is used to define mappings between the file
extensions for source templates and the generated output files. The following
example specifies that source templates with a ".tt2" suffix should
be output as ".html" files:
suffix tt2=html
Or on the command line,
--suffix tt2=html
You can provide any number of different suffix mappings by repeating this
option.
The "binmode" option is used to set the encoding of the output file.
For example use "--binmode=:utf8" to set the output format to
unicode.
Template Dependencies¶
The "depend" and "depend_file" options allow you to specify
how any given template file depends on another file or group of files. The
"depend" option is used to express a single dependency.
$ ttree --depend foo=bar,baz
This command line example shows the "--depend" option being used to
specify that the
foo file is dependant on the
bar and
baz
templates. This option can be used many time on the command line:
$ ttree --depend foo=bar,baz --depend crash=bang,wallop
or in a configuration file:
depend foo=bar,baz
depend crash=bang,wallop
The file appearing on the left of the "=" is specified relative to the
"src" or "lib" directories. The file(s) appearing on the
right can be specified relative to any of these directories or as absolute
file paths.
For example:
$ ttree --depend foo=bar,/tmp/baz
To define a dependency that applies to all files, use "*" on the left
of the "=".
$ ttree --depend *=header,footer
or in a configuration file:
depend *=header,footer
Any templates that are defined in the "pre_process",
"post_process", "process" or "wrapper" options
will automatically be added to the list of global dependencies that apply to
all templates.
The "depend_file" option can be used to specify a file that contains
dependency information.
$ ttree --depend_file=/home/abw/web/example/etc/ttree.dep
Here is an example of a dependency file:
# This is a comment. It is ignored.
index.html: header footer menubar
header: titlebar hotlinks
menubar: menuitem
# spanning multiple lines with the backslash
another.html: header footer menubar \
sidebar searchform
Lines beginning with the "#" character are comments and are ignored.
Blank lines are also ignored. All other lines should provide a filename
followed by a colon and then a list of dependant files separated by
whitespace, commas or both. Whitespace around the colon is also optional.
Lines ending in the "\" character are continued onto the following
line.
Files that contain spaces can be quoted. That is only necessary for files after
the colon (':'). The file before the colon may be quoted if it contains a
colon.
As with the command line options, the "*" character can be used as a
wildcard to specify a dependency for all templates.
* : config,header
ttree also provides access to the usual range of Template Toolkit
options. For example, the "--pre_chomp" and "--post_chomp"
ttree options correspond to the "PRE_CHOMP" and
"POST_CHOMP" options.
Run "ttree -h" for a summary of the options available.
AUTHORS¶
Andy Wardley <abw@andywardley.com>
<
http://www.andywardley.com/>
With contributions from Dylan William Hardison (support for dependencies), Bryce
Harrington ("absolute" and "relative" options), Mark
Anderson ("suffix" and "debug" options), Harald Joerg and
Leon Brocard who gets everywhere, it seems.
VERSION¶
2.68, distributed as part of the Template Toolkit version 2.19, released on 27
April 2007.
COPYRIGHT¶
Copyright (C) 1996-2007 Andy Wardley. All Rights Reserved.
This module is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the
same terms as Perl itself.
SEE ALSO¶
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