PHP templating with str_replace?

Question

I think the basic principle of a PHP templating system is string replacing, right? So can I just use a string to hold my html template code like

$str_template = "<html><head><title>{the_title}</title><body>{the_content}</body></html>"

and in the following code simply do a str_replace to push the data into my template variable like

str_replace( $str_template, '{the_title}', $some_runtime_generated_title );
str_replace( $str_template, '{the_content}', $some_runtime_generated_content );

then at last

echo $str_template;

Will this hopefully make the whole variable passing process a bit faster? I know this could be a weird question but has anybody tried it?

Batandwa · Accepted Answer · 2013-04-05 09:17:43Z

6

Yes, that is the basic idea behind a templating system. You could further abstract it, let an other method add the brackets for example.

You could also use arrays with str_replace and thus do many more replaces with one function call like this

str_replace(array('{the_title}', '{the_content}'), array($title, $content), $str_template);

The system I work with is Spoon Library, their templating system is pretty rock solid, including compiled templates, which are a huge performance gain.

edited Apr 5, 2013 at 9:17

Batandwa

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answered Jan 25, 2009 at 9:23

Javache

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2 Comments

Shawn Over a year ago

Is Spoon Lib faster than smarty?

matpie Over a year ago

Arrays are very nice in this function. As for smarty, pretty much anything is a faster and better option.

Greg Hewgill · Accepted Answer · 2009-01-25 09:00:54Z

4

That is generally the basic idea for a templating system. Real templating systems have many more capabilities, but at the core this is what they do.

You ask whether this will "make the whole variable passing process a bit faster". Faster than what? Are you running into performance problems with something you're doing right now?

answered Jan 25, 2009 at 9:00

Greg Hewgill

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4 Comments

Shawn Over a year ago

sorry I meant faster than the regular templating approach like the Smarty way. No I'm not running into performance problems, just curiosity. Thanks.

Greg Hewgill Over a year ago

Using Smarty will likely be more efficient than what you have proposed. Consider that every time you call str_replace(), once for each variable to substitute, the entire template string must be scanned to look for curly braces to replace. Smarty will do that operation more efficiently.

Greg Hewgill Over a year ago

Oh, another difficulty with the simple string replace is, what happens if your $some_runtime_generated_title contains something that looks like a variable replacement, like "where does {the_content} go?" The next substitution for {the_content} will incorrectly replace that in the title too.

coding Bott Over a year ago

smarty parses the template once to generate php code. the php code is executed then for each request

Gumbo · Accepted Answer · 2009-01-25 10:13:46Z

I would build a parser that breaks the code into it’s tokens (variables and plain text). As an easy approach, you could use the pre_split function to do this:

$tokens = preg_split('/(\{[^\}]+\})/', $string, -1, PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE);

Now you can iterate the tokens and check whether it is a variable or plain text:

foreach ($tokens as $token) {
    if ($token[0] === '{' && $token[strlen($token)-1] === '}') {
        // token is a variable
    } else {
        // token is plain text
    }
}

The advantage of this approach is that variables are not replaced in text that has already been replaced. So:

$foo = '{bar}';
$bar = 'bar';
$template = 'Lorem {foo} {bar} sit amet …';

Here the text would be replaced by Lorem bar {bar} sit amet … and not Lorem bar bar sit amet … as it would happen with your code, when {bar} is being replaced after {foo}.

coding Bott · Accepted Answer · 2013-09-06 20:06:46Z

2

It's a good Idea to use a template engine.

But your idea gets slow when the html is larger and get slower if you are need more variables. remember the replace is executed for every request.

you can use html files containing php tags for output (like <?=$var?>) and loops only. include them via "include" to your php code. thats much faster.

take a look at smarty. this is my favorite template engine for php. smarty has many good features like caching and it is extendable by plugins.

if you understand german take a look here. there is a small introduction into smarty.

edited Sep 6, 2013 at 20:06

answered Jan 25, 2009 at 9:20

coding Bott

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Comments

matpie · Accepted Answer · 2009-01-25 09:01:54Z

1

Sure, you need to have the arguments in the right order though. str_replace()

Also might be a good idea to put the templates in their own file instead of keeping them in a string. Then just read them via file_get_contents() or similar.

answered Jan 25, 2009 at 9:01

matpie

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Comments

PhiLho · Accepted Answer · 2009-01-25 14:23:07Z

1

If you do only variable expansion, you can do:

$str_template = "<html><head><title>$the_title</title><body>$the_content</body></html>";

It will work as well...
Several people wonder why there are template system when PHP is already a template system...

Of course, there are other advantages to these systems, like more secure access to variables, perhaps easier to handle by designers (or to generate by tools), limitation of logic in the view layer... Which is a common criticism of heavy template systems like Smarty, with so much logic that you can almost write another template system with it! ;-)

Some template systems, like Savant, takes a middle road. :-)

answered Jan 25, 2009 at 14:23

PhiLho

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Comments

Your Common Sense · Accepted Answer · 2011-02-25 09:27:26Z

0

You simply can't make a template this way.
A real life template will require not only plain variables to fill but also several control structures, or at least some sort of blocks to control certain areas of the page (to make a loops for example).
So, you can't make a template with str_replace only. Some regexps and sophisticated parsing will be required too.

Thus, it's better to stick with a template engine which already at your disposal - a PHP itself!

edited Feb 25, 2011 at 9:27

answered Feb 22, 2011 at 23:28

Your Common Sense

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1 Comment

CoR Over a year ago

PHP itself... The best answer!

Rajkumar Madhuram · Accepted Answer · 2012-09-13 00:37:36Z

0

Actually the answer from "Your Common Sense" is the right one. You could use PHP to use the current context and replace variables. Instead of writing the output, you could do ob_start() to hold it in a buffer and get the replaced content. Easy and elegant!

answered Sep 13, 2012 at 0:37

Rajkumar Madhuram

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Comments

Artjom B. · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-21 10:19:29Z

0

basically the idea is that one, but template are something that offers lot more, for example RainTPL is WYSIWYG, because it replace relative paths into the template with the server paths, in this way you design your template in local and it works on the server without needs to change img/css.

edited Dec 21, 2014 at 10:19

Artjom B.

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answered Feb 22, 2011 at 23:04

Feulf

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