templatizer

templatizer.js

Simple solution for compiling jade templates into vanilla JS functions for blazin' fast client-side use.

What is this?

Client-side templating is overly complicated, ultimately what you actually want is a function you can call from your JS that puts your data in a template. Why should I have to send a bunch of strings with Mustaches {{}} or other silly stuff for the client to parse? Ultimately, all I want is a function that I can call with some variable to render the string I want.

So, the question is, what's a sane way to get to that point? Enter jade. Simple, intuitive templating, and happens to be what I use on the server anyway. So... Jade has some awesome stuff for compiling templates into functions. I just built templatizer to make it easy to turn a folder full of jade templates into a CommonJS module that exports all the template functions by whatever their file name.

Is it faster?

From my tests it's 6 to 10 times faster than mustache.js with ICanHaz.

How do I use it?

1. Write all your templates as individual jade files in a folder in your project.
2. Somewhere in your build process do this:

var templatizer = require('templatizer');

// pass in the template directory and what you want to 
// save the output file as. That's it!
templatizer(__dirname + '/templates', __dirname + '/demo_output.js');

So a folder like this

/clienttemplates
   user.jade
   app.jade
   otherTemplate.jade

Complies down to a JS file that looks something like this:

// here's about 2k worth of utils that jade uses to DRY up the template code a bit. 
// Includes some basic shims for Object.keys, etc.
var jade=function(exports){ ... }

// a function built from the `user.jade` file
// that takes your data and returns a string.
exports.user = function () {} 

// built from the `app.jade` file
exports.app = function () {} // the function 

// etc. etc

The awesome thing is... there are no external dependencies because they're just functions at this point. Crazy fast, SO MUCH WIN!!!!

License

MIT

If you think this is cool, you should follow me on twitter: @HenrikJoreteg