factor out simplates

[chadwhitacre]

I think we should promote simplates as their own thing. I just bought simplates.org for the purpose. Simplates are a file format for web programming. We should define a standard and release a reference implementation in Python, used by Aspen. We should get simplates supported on GitHub in code blocks and in their Ace editor.

This is a meta issue that will result in new issues. Wanted to capture the general idea.

[chadwhitacre]

I think simplates should be promoted separately from Aspen because what's really needed for Aspen to take root is for tooling to arise around simplates. Think http://prose.io/ as well as Ace and other editor plugins. If simplates are a thing of their own apart from Aspen, it's going to be easier for the wider open-source community to take simplates on board, which (perhaps counter-intuitively) will have a beneficial effect on Aspen.

[chadwhitacre]

We've got http://simplates.org/ up now. Still need to factor out the library.

[webmaven]

You might have some success promoting it as a simpler alternative to iPython notebooks.

[techtonik]

I actually thought they are a part of Gratipay code and not Aspen.

[chadwhitacre]

On #472 it sounds like @pjz has some code on this, but we may end up dropping back and trying strategy 1:

1. Disentangle Aspen's http API from simplates without creating a new library (parallel to how we disentangled the dispatcher).
2. Make a new library off the bat.

[pjz]

Working toward this slowly. Some hangups I could use opinions/ideas on:

1. Renderers are really part of simplates, but right now they're in aspen.renderers with simplates in aspen.resources. Maybe simplates should go into aspen.simplates with aspen.resources doing the deciding whether to use simplates or a simple static resource object? And then renderers could go in aspen.simplate.renderers ?
2. Where should website.default_renderers_by_media_type end up?
3. Where should website.renderer_factories end up? maybe simplate.renderer.factories() ?

[chadwhitacre]

1. Sounds about right.

2 and 3) Let's maybe look at Jinja2 and other templating systems. I believe they generally handle this with a Context object.

[chadwhitacre]

Where "this" is library configuration.

[pjz]

So:

• Move simplates to aspen.simplates; make aspen.resources still choose between simplates and static resources.
• Move aspen.renderers under aspen.simplates
• Make a stub aspen.renderers for backwards compatibility with the renderer modules
• Make SimplateFactory to hold config data like the renderer registry (aka renderer_factories) default_renderers_by_media_type
• more TBD.

Sound good?

[chadwhitacre]

@pjz lgtm

!m @pjz

P.S. I'm on vacation for a week. :] 🌴

[pjz]

...be careful, I might Change The World while you're gone :)

[pjz]

All but the last checkbox there is done in #481 now.

[pjz]

...and now that's done too. With more to come!

[pjz]

Simplates are mostly factored out now. Happy vacation!

[chadwhitacre]

😲

[pjz]

Once the current PR has landed, the next piece will be to actually factor them out into a separate repo with packaging, docs, etc. And also change all the aspen renderer modules into simplate renderer modules. So if someone wants pystache support they'll have to install aspen and simplates-pystache.

It would also be cool to have adapters like maybe flask-simplates or django-simplates, if there's glue code there that could be factored out.

[chadwhitacre]

It would also be cool to have adapters like maybe flask-simplates or django-simplates

Yes! Ideally we can generate enough interest amongst the Flask and Django communities that those shims will get written by third parties.

[chadwhitacre]

What's our plan for other languages besides Python? Currently our application/simplate proto-specification doesn't allow for explicating the language of the first and second sections.

[chadwhitacre]

Let's use https://github.com/gratipay/simplates.org/issues to manage the "factoring out" part.

[chadwhitacre]

The scope of the simplates.org repo is:

• the application/simplate specification
• linking to implementations and tooling
• marketing in general

The Python library we factor out should land at https://github.com/gratipay/simplates.py and be linked on simplates.org as the reference implementation.

[chadwhitacre]

Obvious solution would be a shebang at the top:

#!python
[---]
[---] text/html
Greetings, program!

@pjz mentions this on #474.

[Changaco]

Closing in favor of AspenWeb/salon#13 and https://github.com/AspenWeb/simplates.org/issues.