Views as plugins?

[Éber]

Hey guys!

So here is an idea: What if the view engine was actually a plugin?
Here is what I think...

When we have a request, we can do a bunch different of stuff with
that, generate and manipulate data and prepare a response object.
Views could be just libraries that parses over the response object
generating the proper render for it. That way, it would be really
easy
to use other view engines along with Alloy like Twig, Smarty or
anything else. You just need to create a plugin for it. The plugin
would have the engine and needed helpers and stuff.

Another thing is that, in my mind, things would be far more explicit!
You could easilly inspect a view plugin and it's libraries to see
what
it's capable of. Not that it's not easy right now, that is not the
case, but I think it would be easier to comprehend and extend views
that way. Well, it's just a thought. Let me know what you think (or
not)!

Bye!

[Vance Lucas]

I think for this to work, we would have to allow data to be passed to
any Module\Response object via set() just like it is to View\Template
objects. This would allow plugins to access the data and pass it on.

From a user standpoint, a big issue I see with this approach is I
think it would actually wind up being less clear what is happening,
which is contrary to what Alloy tries to achieve by forcing
explicitness. They return a generic response and then a template gets
rendered somewhere outside the method (wrapped or replaced by a plugin
response). Other questions would arise as well - how do they change
the template file, path, etc?

I'm all for less code - one response may look cleaner than IF
statements of switches - but it has to be crystal clear what is going
on so it is easier to understand and modify. As long as we can
reasonably achieve that, I'm good with it.

--
Vance Lucas
http://www.vancelucas.com