== Wiki Template System ==
See the [[meta:Help:Template|handbook]] for full details and ; the local [[Help:Templates]] article covers essentials as does the [[meta:Help:A_quick_guide_to_templates|Quick Guide]] on metaSee [[wp:Wikipedia:Template_messages]] for info about the templates used in the wikipedia project.
{{Search}}Templates are a system for streamlining the data entry and display formatting of article content.
Unfortunately, despite (old) efforts like '[https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment/Global_bits_and_pieces Global Bits and Pieces]' or [https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Global-Wiki Global Wiki], [https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Global_templates Global Templates are ], '''MediaWiki software does not come with bundled templates'''. There is no 'package' or 'Starter Kit' of useful templates. Each wiki is left to create their own. Although you ''could'' export and import templates from say mediawiki.org, you would end up with a system huge amount of Lua modules and template code that would be overkill for streamlining any regular use case. Global Templates was mentioned in the data entry 2020 Community Wishlist under 'miscellaneous' -> 'translate templates' <ref>https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Wishlist_Survey_2021/Miscellaneous/Templates_translation</ref> but it's not an exact match, and display formatting of article contentlikely won't be adopted anyway. Still, there are at least a couple 'Phabricator' issues related to Templates: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T121470 https://phabricator.wikimedia. org/T243150
=== Types and Examples ===
A simple example of this is the [[wp:U2|Wikipedia article on the rock band 'U2']]. This article and all Wikipedia articles about musical groups use a "Infobox musical artist" template so authors can record the basics about the musical artist: Band name, discography, genre, albums etc., AND that information can be systematically formatted for display in the article.
==== Functional Templates ====
Templates can also be used to include functionality in a page. An example of this is to mark a page, or link to another application systematically based on either a variable, or a "magic word" like PAGENAME More on MediaWiki variables is at [[meta:Help:Variable]]
==== Static Templates ====
Templates can also be used to include static content on a page (kind of like a keyword macro). This is useful when you want to mark a bunch of pages with some common message content, e.g. 'obsolete', '[[:Template:stub|stub]]', 'needs attention' etc.; or perhaps you have a collection of articles that you want to apply a common resource box or navigation to.
=== Using Templates ===
# (optional) create a new page
# insert the template marker in the page content e.g. <nowiki>{{my footer}}</nowiki> would use the 'my footer' template on a page
# (optional) save and re-edit the page as needed to fill out a data entry template
=== Available Templates ===
See all templates in the [[Special:Prefixindex|prefix index]] (choose the 'Template' namespace in the select box, then press 'Go')
=== Debugging Templates ===
You can add <code>action=raw&templates=expand</code> to the end of a page URL to see the raw wikitext as
=== See also ===
The "[[transclusion]]" idea is similar (and shares the same basic syntax) allowing you to include other article content by inclusion.
== OpenOffice Office Templates ==The [[Open Office]] productivity suite includes a template system so that you can create documents that have a common layout.* Templates are good to create a uniform look to See [[presentationLibreOffice]]s made with OpenOffice Impress. * [http://documentation.openoffice.org/Samples_Templates/User/template/index.html the documentation project] offers many templates you can add to your default OpenOffice installation. A Google search will reveal many more if you are looking for something in particular.To use OpenOffice templates in your local system, save the tempate file to your local user template directory. E.g. for Linux users, it would be "/home/<nowiki>[user]</nowiki>/.openoffice.org2/user/template/"
== Programming with Template Systems ==
=== Smarty ===
For PHP programmers, one of the oldest and well-known template systems (aside from building your own using includes) is the [http://smarty.php.net Smarty] system. For a quick overview, see [[wp:Smarty]] There is also a crash course on the Smarty website in addition to the [http://smarty.php.net/manual/en/ documentation]
==== Smarty in CiviCRM ====
As of Feb. 2016, Civi uses Smarty v2
Something like this little one-liner can help to generate your Smarty captures if you have a long list of custom variables
<source lang="php">
php -r 'include ("/var/www/equality-tech.com/www/drupal/sites/all/modules/custom/eqt/eqt.module"); $stack="stats"; $vars = getHaystack($stack); foreach ($vars as $k=>$v) {print "{capture assign=$k}{{$stack}.$k}{/capture}\n";};';
</source>
=== Drupal ===
Offers a choice of template systems
=== Django ===
Uses the Django Template system
{{References}}
[[Category:Help]]
[[Category:Wiki]]
