Passing View Files Into Templates

Let's assume that you have an ordinary view file inside a module.  We'll assume that our view file is called greeting.php and that it accepts a 'name' value as well as an 'age' value, from a greeting() method.

This means that our greeting method may look like this:

function greeting() {
    $data['name'] = 'John';
    $data['age'] = 21;
    $this->view('greeting', $data);
}

As for our view file?  It might contain some simple HTML that may echo (display) our two variables.  For example:

sample view file

Everything we've done here displays a view file and should work without any problems.  However, if you'd like to have your entire view file displayed within a page template then this can be easily be achieved by following this simple two step process:

STEP 1: On your 'greeting' method, replace the line that loads the view file with three lines.  These three lines should:

• declare the name of your module directory
  
• declare the name of the view file (stored within your module)
• load the template

The first line should declare a 'view_module' property and should be set to the folder name of your module.  For example,

$data['view_module'] = 'welcome';

The second line, 'view_file', should declare the name of your view file.  For example:

$data['view_file'] = 'greeting';

The third line should load your template, using Trongate's in-built template() method.  This method accepts two arguments:

• the name of the template that you'd like to load
  
• the data array, containing the information you'd like to pass into the template

For example,

$this->template('public', $data);

So, your complete greeting() method should now look like this:

​​

​​function greeting() {
​​    $data['name'] = 'John';
​​    $data['age'] = 21;
    $data['view_module'] = 'welcome']
​​    $data['view_file'] = 'greeting';
    $this->template('public', $data);
}
​​

STEP 2: Now, open your template view file (public.php).  Go to the area where you'd like your view file to be inserted and add the following line of code:

<?= Template::display($data) ?>

If you've followed along, then your template view file might look something like this:

a template, ready to load a module's view file

Refresh your browser and you should now see your template appearing with your module's view file inside the template.