Table of Contents
Raffle Factory Templating Documentation
Introduction
Raffle Factory uses a very powerful templating engine - Smarty v2. This documentation provides a guide to each file and its purpose in the Raffle Factory display system.
What is a template engine? A (web) template engine is software that is designed to process web templates and content information to output web documents. It runs in the context of a template system. It is practically a PHP script that interprets some kind of pseudo HTML pages containing placeholders for specific variable content. In our case most are raffle related.
This is not a Smarty tutorial, but a HTML experienced user should have no issues working with Smarty templates, also the Raffle Factory variables and objects will be explained, reducing the need for any PHP knowledge.
Smarty operators are similar to PHP's. PHP Operators.
Making use of smarty, the raffle engine will provide to the Smarty engine some pre-filled objects and arrays of objects that are relevant to the current page displayed. Also all language constants defined in Raffle Factory can be accessed in the template. We advice against writing hard coded text into the Templates, since this would render the multi language concept useless. If you do not care about the ability to translate your site, then you can do as needed.
Also use the "translate" function which tells smarty to replace a string with the relevant Joomla translation:
{"COM_RAFFLEFACTORY_SOME_TEXT"|translate}
The default language files are located in [siteroot]language/en-GB/en-GB.com_rafflefactory.ini and [siteroot]/administrator/language/en-GB/en-GB.com_rafflefactory.ini - Use them as a template for translating to other languages.
Template Structure
Pages
Files are located in [siteroot]/components/com_rafflefactory/templates/[template name]/
| Main Template File | Description |
|---|---|
| t_raffledetails.tpl | Contains the Template for Displaying the Raffle Item Details Page |
| t_categories.tpl | Display of Categories Page (Category Directory) |
| t_category_tree.tpl | Display of Categories Tree Page |
| t_catselect.tpl | Category Selection Page |
| t_editraffle.tpl | This is the Template for the “new raffle” and “edit” page, the $task Smarty Variable Contains the Current Task (newraffle or editraffle) |
| t_googlemap.tpl | Google Map Display |
| t_googlemap_tool.tpl | Google Map Select Coordinates Display |
| t_showusers.tpl | User Search Results Page |
| t_listraffles.tpl | The base template for raffle listing. Here are the listing elements being rendered. Most of the output is done in the corresponding *_cell.tpl |
| t_reportraffle.tpl | Raffle Reporting Page Display |
| t_rateraffle.tpl | Rate Raffle Page Display |
| t_myuserdetails.tpl | User's Profile display |
| t_userdetails.tpl | Display of Other Users Details |
| t_myraffles.tpl | Similar to listraffles, only for "My Raffles" |
| t_mytickets.tpl | Similar to listraffles, only for "My Tickets" |
| t_mywatchlist.tpl | Similar to listraffles, only for "My watchlist" |
| t_mywontickets.tpl | Similar to listraffles, only for "My won tickets" |
| t_myratings.tpl | Display for "My Ratings" page |
| t_search.tpl | Template for the Search Page |
| t_search_users.tpl | Template for the Search Users Page |
Elements
| Elements | Description |
|---|---|
| Raffle Detail | Raffle Detail Elements |
| Category | Category Element |
| Lists | Lists Element |
| t_header_filter.tpl | Search Filters Display |
| filter_button.tpl | My Raffles Page Filter |
| t_listfooter.tpl | Pagination Element |
| sort_field.tpl | Sorting Element |
Variables used in all the pages
| Variable | Description |
|---|---|
| $cfg | Settings for the Whole Extension |
| $is_logged_in | 1 if the user is logged in, 0 otherwise |
| $option | Current Option: com_rbids |
| $page_title | Current Page: Categories |
| $task | Current Task: categories |
| $template_file | Current Template: categories |
$auction->get()
Used to call functions from the raffles table, all the returned values will be related to the currently viewed auction.
| PHP function | Returns |
|---|---|
| getFavorite() | True if the raffle is in the user's watchlist |
| getUsername() | Returns the seller's username |
| getCatname() | Returns the category name |
| getStartDate_Text() | Returns the start date |
| getEndDate_Text() | Returns the end date |
| getCountdown() | Returns the expiration countdown timer |
| getExpired() | True if the raffle is expired |
| getTags() | Returns the tags |
| getGallery() | Returns the image gallery |
| getThumbnail() | Returns the main image thumbnail |
| getMust_Rate() | True if the user can rate |
| getOwnerRating() | Returns the seller's rating |
| getI_am_winner() | True if the user is the winner |
| getWinner() | Returns the winner id |
| getImages() | Returns the Raffle images without the gallery plugin |
| getImageCount() | Returns the number of images |
| getMessages() | Returns the raffle messages |
Example:
{if $auction->get('Favorite')} You are Watching this Raffle {/if}
Will output the text on watched raffles.
(!) Documentation based on Raffle Factory version 3.5.0