README.html

   1 <h1>sview : tiny PHP web framework</h1>
   2
   3 <p>
   4     It is inspired by <a href="http://shortphp.com">a similar framework</a> written by Arnór Heiðar Sigurðsson.
   5     In the same spirit but more advanced and more complete, see also <a href="http://nanoc.ws/">nanoc</a> - in Ruby.
   6 </p>
   7
   8 <p>
   9     sview is designed to organize essentially static websites.
  10     It does not offer the features you would expect from a complete MVC framework -
  11     actually, it has only the "V" part.
  12     If you want a more demanding dynamic website, consider using an appropriate tool,
  13     <a href="http://symfony.com/">Symfony</a> for example.
  14 </p>
  15
  16 <h2> How to use it ?</h2>
  17
  18 <p>
  19     The file sample-website.tar.xz provides a basic but full website example.
  20     Alternatively, here are some details about sview usage.
  21 </p>
  22
  23 <h2>0. Installation</h2>
  24
  25 <p>
  26     In the following, I assume your website is located under http\[s\]://domain/topic/
  27     and is named "website" (adapt to your case). For example, in https://github.com/blog/
  28     domain = github.com and topic = blog.
  29 </p>
  30
  31 <p>
  32 Get the source code either with <code>git clone</code> command or using a zip archive.
  33     Copy all folder contents in the website/ folder :
  34 </p>
  35 <pre>website/
  36     a/
  37     f/
  38     site/
  39     .htaccess
  40     common.php
  41     defaults.php
  42     index.php
  43     s.php</pre>
  44 <ul>
  45     <li><b>a/</b> (for "assets") is the folder for CSS files, images and javascript codes.
  46         I like to put them respectively in css/, img/ and js/ folders, but the choice is yours.</li>
  47     <li><b>f/</b> (for "files") is the folder for any downloadable (or browsable) file you may upload.</li>
  48     <li><b>site/</b> is the main folder containing all your website pages. Three are already there :
  49     <ul>
  50         <li><i>404.php</i> : the 404 error page;</li>
  51         <li><i>dl.php</i> : a script to download binary files;</li>
  52         <li><i>home.php</i> : the specifications for the welcome page.</li>
  53     </ul></li>
  54     <li><b>.htaccess</b> : its main job consists in routing everything that is not a resource
  55         to the index.php file.</li>
  56     <li><b>common.php</b> contains shared variables and functions to be used by at least two different pages.</li>
  57     <li><b>defaults.php</b> defines default variables for any web page, like the title or javascripts block.</li>
  58     <li><b>index.php</b> contains your website template, which is rendered for any web page
  59         (and filled with specific values defined in pages under site/ folder; anything can be customized).</li>
  60     <li><b>s.php</b> consists in the framework code, loaded at the beginning of index.php.</li>
  61 </ul>
  62
  63 <p>
  64     Now (online), in the .htaccess file, change the line <code>RewriteBase /</code> to <code>RewriteBase /topic</code>.
  65 </p>
  66
  67 <h2>1. Set default contents</h2>
  68
  69 <span>Edit the file defaults.php with</span>
  70 <ul>
  71     <li>A global title to your website; this title can later be mixed with a more specific
  72         page-based title, or be replaced.</li>
  73     <li>A list of references to CSS style sheets and pre-rendering javascript, like
  74         <code>&lt;link rel="stylesheet" href="http://cran.r-project.org/R.css"/&gt;</code>.
  75         We will see later how to refer to local style sheets (under a/css).</li>
  76     <li>Some javascript code which will be loaded by default after every page loads
  77         (e.g. <a href="http://jquery.com/">jquery</a>).</li>
  78 </ul>
  79
  80 <p>
  81     Each variable name is prepended with "b_" to avoid potential conflicts with your own variables.
  82 </p>
  83
  84 <h2>2. Complete main pages</h2>
  85
  86 <h3>index.php</h3>
  87
  88 <span>Complete</span>
  89 <ul>
  90     <li>The menu (at commented location)</li>
  91     <li>The banner (near the menu, if you want one)</li>
  92     <li>The footer (if you don't want one, just drop it).</li>
  93 </ul>
  94
  95 <p>
  96     You can also change the &lt;meta&gt; tags if needed.
  97 </p>
  98
  99 <h3>site/home.php</h3>
 100
 101 <p>
 102     The welcome page. You can choose a title ($s_title) or use the default one
 103     (by not specifying anything). Style sheets and javascripts can be customized, ...etc.
 104     Any default variable can be used to define a specific variable (prepended with "s_").
 105 </p>
 106
 107 <h3>site/404.php</h3>
 108
 109 <p>
 110     Customize it; it is probably viewed more often than you think ;-)
 111 </p>
 112
 113 <h2>3. Write all other pages</h2>
 114
 115 <p>
 116     All pages are under site/ folder, and you can nest them in any directory tree.
 117 </p>
 118
 119 <p>
 120     <b>Hint</b> : if you don't want to load the main template, just end any site file
 121     with a PHP <code>exit</code> directive.
 122 </p>
 123
 124 <p>
 125     Now we will see how to access pages and resources (images, CSS, files, javascript).
 126 </p>
 127
 128 <hr/>
 129
 130 <h2>How to view a web page ?</h2>
 131
 132 <p>
 133     The page at physical location site/some_folder/mypage.php is viewed in the web browser at the URL
 134     http\[s\]://domain/topic/website/some_folder/mypage (thanks to URL rewriting defined in
 135     the .htaccess file).
 136 </p>
 137
 138 <p>
 139     Any page can be linked internally using the <code>r()</code> PHP function ('r' for "resource"), like in
 140     the following : <code>&lt;a href="&lt;?php echo r('some_folder/mypage'); ?&gt;"&gt;</code>. This function determines
 141     the nesting level and output the appropriate path.
 142 </p>
 143
 144 <h2>How to access...</h2>
 145
 146 <p>
 147     <i>A CSS style sheet</i> : its path is given by the following PHP function call
 148     <code>r('a/css/name_of_the_file.css')</code> from within any site file (assuming you place all CSS files
 149     under a/css/. They may be inside a nested folder structure).
 150 </p>
 151
 152 <p>
 153     <i>An image</i> : same as above, with <code>r('a/img/name_of_the_image.xxx')</code>.
 154 </p>
 155
 156 <p>
 157     <i>A javascript file</i> : same as above, with <code>r('a/js/name_of_the_file.js')</code>.
 158 </p>
 159
 160 <h2>How to give a download link ?</h2>
 161
 162 <p>
 163     Just use a regular link pointing to <code>r('dl/?f=name_of_the_file.xxx')</code>, anywhere you want.
 164 </p>
 165
 166 <hr/>
 167
 168 <h2>Usual workflow</h2>
 169
 170 <p>
 171     Just add pages under site/ folder, and potential resources and files under a/ and f/.
 172     All other files will not change a lot.
 173 </p>