Output Buffer as template engine?

martyn

I saw this code in the manual and though i could use something similar for a full site wide system for replacing text like [text] with data from a database

<?php

function callback($buffer) {

  // replace all the apples with oranges
  return (ereg_replace("apples", "oranges", $buffer));

}

ob_start("callback");

?>

<html>
<body>
<p>It's like comparing apples to oranges.
</body>
</html>

<?php

ob_end_flush();

?>

There are 2 main things i would like to know (I have not got access to PHP for about an hour or so, so cannot try.)

First:

ob_start("callback");

Can i call more than one function???

ob_start("callback" "ob_gzhandler");

As i would like to try gz (the plan is to have a low size site for a lot of people. But we need to conserve bandwidth until we can get the bigger servers, also we are not planning 24 hour gz, just low hit times so that the CPU is not too used up.

The next thing is this:

function callback($buffer) {

// replace all the apples with oranges
return (ereg_replace("apples", "oranges", $buffer));

}

I assume that i could change the functon to this:

function callback($buffer) {

ereg_replace("apples", "oranges", $buffer);
ereg_replace("oranges", "apples", $buffer);

return ($buffer);

}

which would be much more usefulle 😉

Thanks All,

PS i am making this site as a learning thing, rather than the quick and easy way i will use a longer approach which is usually used in bigger websites.

martyn

Still got no time to check!!!

Anyone else used this method before???

martyn

Me again 😉

bump

majiclab

I've been working on a CMS lately that uses output buffering, however it does not use the callback. However, what you are proposing but here are two issues.

martyn:
First:

ob_start("callback");

Can i call more than one function???

Like

ob_start("callback" "ob_gzhandler");

No. However, you could call ob_gzhandler from callback()... 🙂

martyn:
I assume that i could change the functon to this:

function callback($buffer) {

ereg_replace("apples", "oranges", $buffer);
ereg_replace("oranges", "apples", $buffer);

return ($buffer);

}

Yes and no. First of all, you are not saving the results from ereg_replace(), but if you did, the first line would change all your apples to oranges, but then the second line would change all your oranges back to apples. However, I'm assuming that on your site you wouldn't be changing that. You could probably do something like this:

<?php
function callback($buffer)
{
    $buffer = ereg_replace('[text1]', 'value', $buffer);
    $buffer = ereg_replace('[text2]', 'value2', $buffer);
    // and so on

// and then...
return ob_gzhandler($buffer);
}
?>

That way you can do all your replacements, but it will also run it through the GZ handler...

Hope that helps!

-Percy

m_tt

I really like this percy guy, good stuff 🙂

martyn

I just got some time to do some coding, like i just got the email.

Here is what i have so far:

<?php

function callback($buffer) {

  // replace all the apples with oranges
  $buffer = ereg_replace('\[fruit\]', 'oranges', $buffer);

  return $buffer;

}

ob_start("callback");

?>

<html>
<body>
<p>It's like comparing [fruit] to oranges.
</body>
</html>

<?php

ob_end_flush();

?>

You missed the \'s in the code 😉 LOL, if you leave em out you get

Ioranges's lorangeske compaorangesorangesng [orangesorangesorangesorangesoranges] orangeso oorangesanges.

Which is a lot of oranges :S

Thanks, i will forget using gzip for the moment anyhow. It would seem i did not install the extension 😕 .

Ok thanks all.