Default values for sections.

[vensko]

No description provided.

[reinink]

Hey @vensko, thanks so much for taking the time to contribute to Plates! Very much appreciated. While I like the problem you're trying to solve here, I'm concerned that it causes repeating logic. Consider this example:

<?php if ($this->section('sidebar', $this->fetch('default-sidebar'))): ?>
    <div id="sidebar">
        <?=$this->section('sidebar', $this->fetch('default-sidebar'))?>
    </div>
<?php endif ?>

Currently you would do this instead:

<div id="sidebar">
    <?php if ($this->section('sidebar')): ?>
        <?=$this->section('sidebar')?>
    <?php else ?>
        <?=$this->fetch('default-sidebar')?>
    <?php endif ?>
</div>

Now I understand the current approach requires a couple extra lines of code (mostly caused by the if statement), but I do find this much more readable.

You could assign the response to a variable, but that technically breaks our syntax recommendation to "avoid variable assignment".

<?php if ($sidebar = $this->section('sidebar', $this->fetch('default-sidebar'))): ?>
    <div id="sidebar">
        <?=$sidebar?>
    </div>
<?php endif ?>

Finally, I'm a little concerned that this approach encourages putting HTML into PHP strings, which I find generally makes templates less readable. Clearly this doesn't have to be done like this (consider my fetch() examples above), but unfortunately I think it probably will more often than not.

Because of these concerns, I'm thinking that the current if/else approach, albeit a little less elegant, may still be more appropriate. I do this this will prompt me to add a "default section content" example to the documentation though.

Either way, thanks again for contributing to this project! I hope the above reasons make sense.

[vensko]

This feature is meant to be used with inline text, for instance:
<title><?=$this->section('pagetitle', 'Site name')?></title>
Also, it makes transition from Symfony Templating with Slots Helper easier.

[reinink]

Okay, I hadn't considered that use case. I guess there's no reason why both approaches couldn't be used.

[reinink]

This feature has been added to the 3.0.3 release.