PHP: Using Included Content for your template
Page
template is repeated over and over within a site. the layout of the template
generally does not change. Because of this, it lends itself to be includes
for each of your page. This will eliminate recreating the template each
time.
- In the tutorial you will be breaking apart a template to create
includes that will not change, so when reconstructed in PHP it will
display correctly.
A graphic template created say in Photoshop is sliced into a table
format, so that the content area is generally enclosed in a table cell. If
done right, your template could be included into each page with PHP commands
and when you change the template, you will change all your pages.
The Layout of a template will look like this:
|
CODE |
What I will call it in the class |
<html>
<head>
</head>
|
This is the head of your document. It contains the
metatags, pagename, and scripts used in the page. |
<body>
<TABLE>
<TR>
<TD>
</td>
More template stuff
<TD> |
This is the top part of the table which contains all
the template that is to the left and above the content cell. |
YOUR CONTENT CELL
HERE
|
This is the content cell of your template |
</TD>
</TR>
possibly more template stuff
</TABLE> |
This is the bottom and right of your template. |
</body>
</html> |
End of your HTML doc. |
If you think about pages and what is specific for any one URL and what is
in common with a group of pages, you can save time by using includes.
- In this case each page uses a unique title and metatag so this should
not be in a include.
- The top part of the table is common on each page and can be used in an
include.
- The content of your template can be written in simple html, with
little formatting and included for each page (or not included as it
changes in each page depending on your style or use of data base)
- The bottom of the table template is the same in each page and so is
the end of the page.
Include basics
- An Included file can be PHP, text, html or other.
- Any HTML formatting within the included file will be interpreted in
the page.
- If your included file is a php file, the php coding within it will
be interpreted for the inclusion.
- The included file can be a relative link or an exact URL. Some
servers do not allow linking includes from other domains and therefore
will only allow relative URLS.
- An Include in PHP looks like this:
<?
include ("includedfile.php");
?>
- All relative links in your included file will be interpreted as
relative links from the location of your file the include is contained
in.
Include Activity 1. Create the html template as described in
this tutorial of a basic html template.
2. Add the PHP Copyright code into your
template from this tutorial and rename your template with a php
extension. 3. Set up an include for the content cell of your document.
Call your content page mypage.htm.
<?
include ("mypage.htm");
?>
4. Use a text file or php file or html document you already have on your
site that is not in a template. Please the include in your document. The
code will look like this:
<html>
<head>
<title>HTML Web Page Template</title>
</head>
<body>
<table width="780" align="center" border="1" bordercolor="#000000">
<tr>
<td colspan="2" bgcolor="#000080" align="center">
<h1 style="color:white">Developing Webs Group</h1>
<h5 style="color:white">A Web Development
Community</h5>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#000080" width="120" align="center">
<h4 style="color:white">Photoshop</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">HTML</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">PHP</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">Flash</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">CSS</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">MessageBoard</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">Contact</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">Home</h4>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff" width="660">
<?
include ("mypage.htm");
?>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="2" bgcolor="#000080" align="center">
<?
//Provided by Developingwebs.net
echo "Copyright © 1998-".date('Y');
?>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
5. Create an include file for the top of the template. Copy the top of
the table for the template into a new document called topinclude.htm. For
the template above, The source for the file will look like this:
<body>
<table width="780" align="center" border="1" bordercolor="#000000">
<tr>
<td colspan="2" bgcolor="#000080" align="center">
<h1 style="color:white">Developing Webs Group</h1>
<h5 style="color:white">A Web Development
Community</h5>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#000080" width="120" align="center">
<h4 style="color:white">Photoshop</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">HTML</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">PHP</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">Flash</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">CSS</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">MessageBoard</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">Contact</h4>
<h4 style="color:white">Home</h4>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff" width="660">
Simply take the top part of the code for the table, above the content
include and paste it into a text file. Click File=> save as. Set the
filename to topinclude.htm and set the filetype to all files. Place this in
the same directory as my template file. 6. Create an include file for the
bottom of the template. Copy the top of the table for the template into a
new document called bottominclude.php. This must be a PHP file since it
includes a PHP script for copyright. For the template above in #4, The
source for the file will look like this:
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="2" bgcolor="#000080" align="center">
<?
//Provided by Developingwebs.net
echo "Copyright © 1998-".date('Y');
?>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
7. Create the include statements to be placed in the top of the table
template and the bottom of the table include statements so that your
original template document now looks like this:
<html>
<head>
<title>HTML Web Page Template</title>
</head>
<?
include ("topinclude.htm");
?>
<?
include ("mypage.htm");
?>
<?
include ("bottominclude.php");
?>
8. Save your new template as a php and test it on a php server. Look at
the source code when you have it in a broswer and check out how the scripts
are interpreted into html! |
