README

MLView is the built‑in, lightweight template engine for MonkeysLegion, designed to help you write clean, component‑driven views with minimal boilerplate.

🌟 Key Features

Escaped output: {{ $var }} → safe, HTML‑escaped data
Raw output: {!! $html !!} → unescaped HTML (use responsibly)
Components: <x-card title="...">...</x-card> → reusable view fragments
Slots: @slot('header')…@endslot → named content areas inside components
Layout inheritance: @extends('parent'), @section('name')…@endsection, @yield('name')
Caching & Hot‑Reload: compiled PHP cached in var/cache/views; auto‑recompiles modified templates

📂 Directory Structure

my-app/
├─ resources/views/
│  ├─ home.ml.php              # Top‑level view
│  ├─ posts/
│  │  └─ show.ml.php           # Nested view under posts/
│  └─ components/
│     ├─ layout.ml.php         # Layout component for <x-layout>
│     └─ alert.ml.php          # Alert component
└─ var/
   └─ cache/views/             # Generated PHP cache files

Dot‑notation when rendering:

home → resources/views/home.ml.php
posts.show → resources/views/posts/show.ml.php

✏️ Basic Syntax

1. Echoing Data

<p>Name: {{ \$user->name }}</p>   <!-- escaped -->
<p>Bio: {!! \$user->bio !!}</p>   <!-- raw -->

2. Components & Slots

<x-alert type="error">
  @slot('header')
    <strong>Error:</strong>
  @endslot
  <p>Something went wrong.</p>
</x-alert>

resources/views/components/alert.ml.php:

<div class="alert alert-<?= \$type ?>">
  <?= \$slots['header']() ?>
  <?= \$slotContent ?>
</div>

Attributes (type="error") become PHP variables (\$type).
Named slots captured as closures in \$slots['name'].
Default slot content available as \$slotContent.

3. Layout Components

<x-layout title="Dashboard">
  @slot('header')
    <h1>Dashboard</h1>
  @endslot

  <p>Main content…</p>
</x-layout>

resources/views/components/layout.ml.php might include <?= \$slots['header']() ?> and <?= \$slotContent ?> zones.

4. Layout Inheritance

Parent layout (resources/views/layouts/app.ml.php):

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
  <title>@yield('title')</title>
</head>
<body>
  <header>@yield('header')</header>
  <main>@yield('content')</main>
  <footer>© {{ date('Y') }} MonkeysLegion</footer>
</body>
</html>

Child view (resources/views/home.ml.php):

@extends('layouts.app')

@section('title')
  {{ \$title }}
@endsection

@section('header')
  <h1>Welcome!</h1>
@endsection

@section('content')
  <p>Home page content…</p>
@endsection

@extends('layouts.app') indicates the parent template
@section('…')…@endsection blocks define content
@yield('…') in the parent is replaced by each section

⚙️ Rendering Pipeline

Loader: resolves raw .ml.php + cache path
Parser: transforms <x-*>, @slot, @section, @yield, {{ }}, {!! !!} into an AST
Compiler: generates pure PHP code from the AST
Cache: writes to var/cache/views/<name>.php and includes it

🔄 Caching & Hot‑Reload

Location: var/cache/views
Auto‑invalidate: template timestamp checked on each render
Manual clear: php vendor/bin/ml cache:clear

🔧 Extensibility

Custom directives: add regex callbacks in Compiler
AST extensions: enhance Parser for new syntax
Alternative loaders: swap Loader for custom sources (DB, remote)

Debugging

Dump data: @dump(\$variable) inside templates to var_dump

Happy templating with MLView! 🚀

monkeyscloud / monkeyslegion-template

Maintainers

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