Language Guide // Marko

Table of Contents

Template Directives Overview

Almost all of the Marko templating directives can be used as either an attribute or as an element. For example:

Applying directives using attributes:

<!-- Colors available -->
<ul if="notEmpty(colors)">
    <li for="color in colors">
        $color
    </li>
</ul>

<!-- No colors available -->
<div if="empty(colors)">
    No colors!
</div>

Applying directives using elements:

<!-- Colors available -->
<if test="notEmpty(colors)">
    <ul>
        <for each="color in colors">
            <li>
                $color
            </li>
        </for>
    </ul>
</if>

<!-- No colors available -->
<if test="empty(colors)">
    <div>
        No colors!
    </div>
</if>

The disadvantage of using elements to control structural logic is that they change the nesting of the elements which can impact readability. For this reason it is often more suitable to apply directives as attributes.

Text Replacement

Dynamic text is supported using either $<variable-reference> or ${<javascript-expression>}.

Examples:

Hello $data.name!
Hello ${data.name}!
Hello ${data.name.toUpperCase()}!

By default, all special HTML characters will be escaped in dynamic text to prevent Cross-site Scripting (XSS) Attacks. To disable HTML escaping, you can use $! as shown in the following sample code:

Hello $!{data.name}! <!-- Do not escape -->

If necessary, you can escape $ using a forward slash to have it be treated as text instead of a placeholder token:

Test: \${hello}
<!-- Rendered Output:
Test: ${hello}
-->

Expressions

Wherever expressions are allowed, they are treated as JavaScript expressions and copied out to the compiled template verbatim. However, you can choose to use alternate versions of the following JavaScript operators:

JavaScript Operator Marko Equivalent
&& and
|| or
=== eq
!== ne
< lt
> gt
<= le
>= ge

For example, both of the following are valid and equivalent:

<div if="searchResults.length > 100">
    Show More
</div>

<div if="searchResults.length gt 100">
    Show More
</div>

Includes

Marko supports includes/partials. Other Marko files can be included using the <include> tag and a relative path. For example:

<include template="./greeting.marko" name="Frank" count="30"/>

Alternatively, you can pass the template data using the template-data attribute whose value should be a JavaScript expression that resolves to the template data as shown below:

<include template="./greeting.marko" template-data="{ name: 'Frank', count: 30 }"/>

The value of the template attribute can also be a dynamic JavaScript expression that resolves to a loaded template as shown below:

In your JavaScript controller:

var myIncludeTarget = require('./my-include-target.marko');
var anotherIncludeTarget = require('./another-include-target.marko');


template.render({
        myIncludeTarget: myIncludeTarget,
        anotherIncludeTarget: anotherIncludeTarget
    },
    ...);

And then in your template:

<include template="${data.myIncludeTarget}" name="Frank" count="30"/>
<include template="${data.anotherIncludeTarget}" name="Frank" count="30"/>

You can also choose to load the include target within the calling template as shown below:

<require module="./my-include-target.marko" var="myIncludeTarget" />
...
<include template="${data.myIncludeTarget}" name="Frank" count="30"/>

Variables

Input data passed to a template is made available using a special data variable. It's possible to declare your own variables as shown in the following sample code:

<var name="name" value="data.name.toUpperCase()" />

To assign a new value to an existing variable the <assign> tag can be used as shown in the following sample code:

<assign var="name" value="data.name.toLowerCase()" />

The <with> directive can be used to create scoped variables as shown in the following sample code:

<with vars="nameUpper=data.name.toUpperCase(); nameLower=data.name.toLowerCase()">
    Hello $nameUpper!
    Hello $nameLower!
</with>

Conditionals

if...else-if...else

Any element or fragment of HTML can be made conditional using the following directives:

Applied as attributes:

<!--Simple if-->
<div if="someCondition">
    Hello World
</div>

<!--Simple unless-->
<div unless="someCondition">
    Hello World
</div>

<!--Complex if-->
<div if="test === 'a'">
  A
</div>
<div else-if="test === 'b'">
  B
</div>
<div else-if="test === 'c'">
  C
</div>
<div else>
  Something else
</div>

<!--Complex unless-->
<div unless="test === 'a'">
    A
</div>
<div else-if="test === 'b'">
  B
</div>
<div else>
  Something else
</div>

Applied as elements:

<!-- Colors available -->
<!--Simple if-->
<if test="someCondition">
    <div>
        Hello World
    </div>
</if>


<!--Complex if-->
<if test="test === 'a'">
    <div>
        A
    </div>
</if>
<else-if test="test === 'b'">
    <div>
        B
    </div>
</else-if>
<else-if test="test === 'c'">
    <div>
        C
    </div>
</else-if>
<else>
    <div>
        Something else
    </div>
</else>

unless...else-if...else

The unless directive is also supported as an alternative to if in cases where the condition should be negated.

<!--Simple unless-->
<div unless="someCondition">
    Hello World
</div>

<!--Complex unless-->
<div unless="test === 'a'">
    A
</div>
<div else-if="test === 'b'">
  B
</div>
<div else>
  Something else
</div>

Applied as elements:

<!--Simple unless-->
<unless test="someCondition">
    <div>
        Hello World
    </div>
</unless>

<!--Complex unless-->
<unless test="test === 'a'">
    <div>
        A
    </div>
</unless>
<else-if test="test === 'b'">
    <div>
        B
    </div>
</else-if>
<else-if test="test === 'c'">
    <div>
        C
    </div>
</else-if>
<else>
    <div>
        Something else
    </div>
</else>

Shorthand Conditionals

Shorthand conditionals allow for conditional values inside attributes or wherever expressions are allowed. Shorthand conditionals are of the following form: {?<expression>;<true-template>[;<false-template>]}

For example:

<div class="{?active;tab-active}">Hello</div>

With a value of true for active, the output would be the following:

<div class="tab-active">Hello</div>

With a value of false for active, the output would be the following:

<div>Hello</div>

NOTE: If the expression inside an attribute evaluates to null or an empty string then the attribute is not included in the output.

As shown in the previous example, the "else" block for shorthand conditionals is optional. The usage of an else block is shown below:

<div class="{?active;tab-active;tab-inactive}">Hello</div>

With a value of false for active, the output would be the following:

<div class="tab-inactive">Hello</div>

Conditional Attributes

Marko supports conditional attributes when the value of an attribute is an expression. Marko also supports HTML boolean attributes (e.g., <input type="checkbox" checked>) If an attribute value resolves to null, undefined, false or an empty string then the attribute will not be rendered. If an attribute value resolves to true then only the attribute name will rendered.

For example, given the following data:

{
    title: '',
    active: true,
    checked: false,
    disabled: true
}

And the following template:

<img src="foo.png" alt="${data.title}">

<div class="{?data.active;tab-active}"></div>

<input type="checkbox"
    checked="${data.checked}"
    disabled="${data.disabled}">

The output HTML will be the following:

<img src="foo.png">

<div></div>

<input type="checkbox" disabled>

Looping

for

Any element can be repeated for every item in an array using the for directive. The directive can be applied as an element or as an attribute.

Applied as an attribute:

<ul>
    <li for="item in items">${item}</li>
</ul>

Applied as an element:

<ul>
    <for each="item in items">
        <li>${item}</li>
    </for>
</ul>

Given the following value for items:

["red", "green", "blue"]

The output would be the following:

<ul>
    <li>red</li>
    <li>green</li>
    <li>blue</li>
</ul>

Loop Status Variable

The for directive also supports a loop status variable in case you need to know the current loop index. For example:

<ul>
    <li for="color in colors; status-var=loop">
        $color
        ${loop.getIndex()+1}) of ${loop.getLength()}
        <if test="loop.isFirst()"> - FIRST</if>
        <if test="loop.isLast()"> - LAST</if>
    </li>
</ul>

Loop Separator

<for each="color in colors" separator=", ">$color</for>

<div>
    <span for="color in colors; separator=', '" style="color: $color">$color</span>
</div>

Range Looping

A range can be provided in the following format; <var-name> from <from> to <to>[ step <step>].

The from, to and step values must be numerical expressions. If not specified, step defaults to 1.

<ul>
    <li for="i from 0 to 10">
        $i
    </li>
</ul>

<ul>
    <li for="i from 0 to 10 step 2">
        $i
    </li>
</ul>

<ul>
    <li for="i from 0 to myArray.length-1">
        ${myArray[i]}
    </li>
</ul>

Property Looping

<ul>
    <li for="(name,value) in settings">
        <b>$name</b>:
        $value
    </li>
</ul>

Custom Iterator

A custom iterator function can be passed as part of the view model to the template to control looping over data.

A sample custom iterator function that loops over an array in reverse is shown below:

{
    reverseIterator: function(arrayList, callback) {
        for(var i=arrayList.length-1; i>=0; i--){
            callback(arrayList[i]);
        }
    }
}

The custom iterator can then be used in a template as shown below:

Applied as part of a for attribute:

<div for="item in ['a', 'b', 'c']; iterator=data.reverseIterator">
    $item
</div>
<!--
Output:
<div>c</div><div>b</div><div>a</div>
-->

Applied as part of a <for> element:

<for each="item in ['a', 'b', 'c']" iterator="data.reverseIterator">
    $item
</for>
<!--
Output:
cba
-->

Custom iterators also support providing a custom status object for each loop iteration:

{
    reverseIterator: function(arrayList, callback){
        var statusVar = {first: 0, last: arrayList.length-1};
        for(var i=arrayList.length-1; i>=0; i--){
            statusVar.index = i;
            callback(arrayList[i], statusVar);
        }
    }
}

Applied as part of a for attribute:

<div for="item in ['a', 'b', 'c']; iterator=data.reverseIterator; status-var=status">
    ${status.index}$item
</div>
<!--
Output:
<div>2c</div><div>1b</div><div>0a</div>
-->

Applied as part of a <for> element:

<for each="item in ['a', 'b', 'c']" iterator="data.reverseIterator" status-var="status">
    ${status.index}$item
</for>
<!--
Output:
2c1b0a
-->

Macros

Parameterized macros allow for reusable fragments within an HTML template. A macro can be defined using the <def> directive.

def

The <def> directive can be used to define a reusable function within a template.

<def function="greeting(name, count)">
    Hello $name! You have $count new messages.
</def>

The above macro can then be invoked as part of any expression. Alternatively, the <invoke> directive can be used invoke a macro function using named attributes. The following sample template shows how to use macro functions inside expressions:

<def function="greeting(name, count)">
    Hello $name! You have $count new messages.
</def>

<p>
    ${greeting("John", 10)}
</p>
<p>
    ${greeting("Frank", 20)}
</p>

invoke

The <invoke> directive can be used to invoke a function defined using the <def> directive or a function that is part of the input data to a template. The <invoke> directive allows arguments to be passed using element attributes, but that format is only supported for functions that were previously defined using the <def> directive.

<def function="greeting(name, count)">
    Hello ${name}! You have ${count} new messages.
</def>

<invoke function="greeting" name="John" count="${10}"/>
<invoke function="greeting('Frank', 20)"/>

The output for the above template would be the following:

<p>
    Hello John! You have 10 new messages.
</p>
<p>
    Hello Frank! You have 20 new messages.
</p>

NOTE: By default, the arguments will be of type "string" when using <invoke>. However, argument attributes support JavaScript expressions which allow for other types of arguments. Example:

count="10" <!-- string argument -->
count="${10}"  <!-- number argument -->

Structure Manipulation

attrs

The attrs attribute allows attributes to be dynamically added to an element at runtime. The value of the attrs attribute should be an expression that resolves to an object with properties that correspond to the dynamic attributes. For example:

<div attrs="myAttrs">
    Hello World!
</div>

Given the following value for the myAttrs variable:

{style: "background-color: #FF0000;", "class": "my-div"}

The output would then be the following:

<div style="background-color: #FF0000;" class="my-div">
    Hello World!
</div>

body-only-if

If you find that you have a wrapper element that is conditional, but whose body should always be rendered then you can use the body-only-if attribute to handle this use case. For example, to only render a wrapping <a> tag if there is a valid URL then you could do the following:

<a href="${data.linkUrl}" body-only-if="!data.linkUrl">
    Some body content
</a>

Given a value of "http://localhost/" for the data.linkUrl variable: , the output would be the following:

<a href="http://localhost/">
    Some body content
</a>

Given a value of undefined for the data.linkUrl variable: , the output would be the following:

Some body content

Comments

Standard HTML comments can be used to add comments to your template. The HTML comments will not show up in the rendered HTML.

Example comments:

<!-- This is a comment that will not be rendered -->
<h1>Hello</h1>

If you would like for your HTML comment to show up in the final output then you can use the custom html-comment tag:

<html-comment>This is a comment that *will* be rendered</html-comment>
<h1>Hello</h1>

Output:

<!--This is a comment that *will* be rendered-->
<h1>Hello</h1>

Whitespace

The Marko compiler will remove unnecessary whitespace based on some builtin rules, by default. These rules are partially based on the rules that browser's use to normalize whitespace and partially based on the goal of allowing nicely indented markup with minified output. These rules are as follows:

In addition, whitespace within the following tags is preserved by default:

Example template:

<div>
    <a href="/home">
        Home
    </a>
    <a href="/Profile">
        My   Profile
    </a>
    <textarea>
Hello
World</textarea
</div>

Example output:

<div><a href="/home">Home</a><a href="/Profile">My Profile</a><textarea>
Hello
World</textarea</div>

The following options are available to control whitespace removal:

Option 1) Disable whitespace removal using the compiler-options tag:

<compiler-options whitespace="preserve" />
<div>
    <img src="foo.jpg">
    <img src="foo.jpg">
</div>

Option 2) Disable whitespace removal using the c-whitespace attribute:

<div c-whitespace="preserve">
    <img src="foo.jpg">
    <img src="foo.jpg">
</div>

Option 3) Disable all whitespace removal by changing a compiler option

require('marko/compiler').defaultOptions.preserveWhitespace = true;

Option 4) Control whitespace removal for specific tags

require('marko/compiler').defaultOptions.preserveWhitespace = {
    'pre': true,
    'textarea': true,
    'script': true
};

Option 5) Configured a custom tag to preserve whitespace

Adding the "preserve-whitespace": true property to a tag definition will result in the Marko compiler preserving whitespace wherever that tag is encountered in a template.

Helpers

Since Marko template files compile into CommonJS modules, any Node.js module can be "imported" into a template for use as a helper module. For example, given the following helper module:

src/util.js:

exports.reverse = function(str) {
    var out = "";
    for (var i=str.length-1; i>=0; i--) {
        out += str.charAt(i);
    }
    return out;
};

The above module can then be imported into a template as shown in the following sample template:

src/template.marko:

<require module="./util" var="util" />

<div>${util.reverse('reverse test')}</div>

It's also possible to pass helper functions to a template as part of the view model:

var template = require('./template.marko');

template.render({
        reverse: function(str) {
            var out = "";
            for (var i=str.length-1; i>=0; i--) {
                out += str.charAt(i);
            }
            return out;
        }
    },
    function(err, html) { ... });

Usage inside template:

<div>${data.reverse('reverse test')}</div>

Aside from custom helpers that can be built per-project, Marko has some built-in helpers with support for common tasks.

empty()/notEmpty()

To deal with "empty" data, Marko provides the empty() and notEmpty() helpers. Both helpers can be used to check for empty objects (objects, that are set to null), arrays of length zero or empty strings; empty() returns true for these cases exclusively. Therefore, not all "falsy" JavaScript values are reported as "empty" - e.g.: a boolean value that is set to "false" is not empty, hence notEmpty() would return "true". As their name already suggests, both helpers are contrary to each other.

Global Properties

The $global property is used to add data that is available to all templates encountered during rendering by having the data hang off the wrapped writer.

template.render({
    $global: {
        name: 'Frank'
    }
}, res);

Given the following template:

<div>
    Hello ${out.global.name}!
</div>

The output would be the following:

<div>
    Hello Frank
</div>

Custom Tags and Attributes

Marko supports extending the language with custom tags and attributes. A custom tag or a custom attribute must have at least one dash to indicate that is not part of the standard HTML grammar.

Below illustrates how to use a simple custom tag:

<div>
    <my-hello name="World"/>
</div>

The output of the above template might be the following:

<div>
    Hello World!
</div>

For information on how to use and create taglibs, please see the Custom Taglibs section below.

Async Taglib

The async taglib allows portions of your template to be rendered asynchronously. An asynchronous fragment can be bound to a function that accepts an "args" objects and callback argument. When the data provider function completes and invokes the callback with the resulting data, the body of the async fragment is then rendered with the asynchronous data assigned to the specified variable. As an additional feature, asynchronous fragments allow parts of your page to render out-of-order while still providing the final HTML in the correct order allowing to have very reactive websites with almost instant visual feedback. Features like out-of-order rendering, that are based on client-reordering, require the use of JavaScript. Websites that have to render completely without JavaScript should avoid using this additional feature (they can still use asynchronous fragments though).

Example:

template.render({
        userProfileDataProvider: function(arg, callback) {
            var userId = arg.userId;
            userProfileService.getUserProfile(userId, callback);
        }
    }, ...);

<async-fragment data-provider="data.userProfileDataProvider"
    var="userProfile"
    arg-userId="${data.userId}">

    <ul>
        <li>
            First name: ${userProfile.firstName}
        </li>
        <li>
            Last name: ${userProfile.lastName}
        </li>
        <li>
            Email address: ${userProfile.email}
        </li>
    </ul>

</async-fragment>

For more details, please see https://github.com/marko-js/marko-async.

Layout Taglib

Marko provides a layout taglib to support separating out layout from content. The usage of of the layout taglib is shown in the sample code below:

default-layout.marko:

<!doctype html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
    <meta charset="UTF-8">
    <title><layout-placeholder name="title"/></title>
</head>
<body>
    <h1 if="data.showHeader !== false">
        <layout-placeholder name="title"/>
    </h1>
    <p>
        <layout-placeholder name="body"/>
    </p>
    <div>
        <layout-placeholder name="footer">
            Default Footer
        </layout-placeholder>
    </div>
</body>
</html>

Usage of default-layout.marko:

<layout-use template="./default-layout.marko" show-header="$true">
    <layout-put into="title">My Page</layout-put>
    <layout-put into="body">BODY CONTENT</layout-put>
</layout-use>

For more details, please see https://github.com/marko-js/marko-layout.