There are two types of markup in Liquid: Output and Tag.
- Output markup (which may resolve to text) is surrounded by
{{ matched pairs of curly brackets (ie, braces) }}
- Tag markup (which cannot resolve to text) is surrounded by
{% matched pairs of curly brackets and percent signs %}
Here is a simple example of Output:
Hello {{name}}
Hello {{user.name}}
Hello {{ 'tobi' }}
Output markup takes filters. Filters are simple methods. The first parameter is always the output of the left side of the filter. The return value of the filter will be the new left value when the next filter is run. When there are no more filters, the template will receive the resulting string.
Hello {{ 'tobi' | upcase }}
Hello tobi has {{ 'tobi' | size }} letters!
Hello {{ '*tobi*' | textilize | upcase }}
Hello {{ 'now' | date: "%Y %h" }}
date
- reformat a date (syntax reference)capitalize
- capitalize words in the input sentencedowncase
- convert an input string to lowercaseupcase
- convert an input string to uppercasefirst
- get the first element of the passed in arraylast
- get the last element of the passed in arrayjoin
- join elements of the array with certain character between themsort
- sort elements of the arraymap
- map/collect an array on a given propertysize
- return the size of an array or stringescape
- escape a stringescape_once
- returns an escaped version of html without affecting existing escaped entitiesstrip_html
- strip html from stringstrip_newlines
- strip all newlines (\n) from stringnewline_to_br
- replace each newline (\n) with html breakreplace
- replace each occurrence e.g.{{ 'foofoo' | replace:'foo','bar' }} #=> 'barbar'
replace_first
- replace the first occurrence e.g.{{ 'barbar' | replace_first:'bar','foo' }} #=> 'foobar'
remove
- remove each occurrence e.g.{{ 'foobarfoobar' | remove:'foo' }} #=> 'barbar'
remove_first
- remove the first occurrence e.g.{{ 'barbar' | remove_first:'bar' }} #=> 'bar'
truncate
- truncate a string down to x characters. It also accepts a second parameter that will append to the string e.g.{{ 'foobarfoobar' | truncate: 5, '.' }} #=> 'foob.'
truncatewords
- truncate a string down to x wordsprepend
- prepend a string e.g.{{ 'bar' | prepend:'foo' }} #=> 'foobar'
append
- append a string e.g.{{ 'foo' | append:'bar' }} #=> 'foobar'
slice
- slice a string. Takes an offset and length, e.g.{{ "hello" | slice: -3, 3 }} #=> llo
minus
- subtraction e.g.{{ 4 | minus:2 }} #=> 2
plus
- addition e.g.{{ '1' | plus:'1' }} #=> 2
,{{ 1 | plus:1 }} #=> 2
times
- multiplication e.g{{ 5 | times:4 }} #=> 20
divided_by
- integer division e.g.{{ 10 | divided_by:3 }} #=> 3
round
- rounds input to the nearest integer or specified number of decimalssplit
- split a string on a matching pattern e.g.{{ "a~b" | split:"~" }} #=> ['a','b']
modulo
- remainder, e.g.{{ 3 | modulo:2 }} #=> 1
Tags are used for the logic in your template. New tags are very easy to code, so I hope to get many contributions to the standard tag library after releasing this code.
Here is a list of currently supported tags:
- assign - Assigns some value to a variable
- capture - Block tag that captures text into a variable
- case - Block tag, its the standard case...when block
- comment - Block tag, comments out the text in the block
- cycle - Cycle is usually used within a loop to alternate between values, like colors or DOM classes.
- for - For loop
- break - Exits a for loop
- continue Skips the remaining code in the current for loop and continues with the next loop
- if - Standard if/else block
- include - Includes another template; useful for partials
- raw - temporarily disable tag processing to avoid syntax conflicts.
- unless - Mirror of if statement
Any content that you put between {% comment %}
and {% endcomment %}
tags is turned into a comment.
We made 1 million dollars {% comment %} in losses {% endcomment %} this year
Raw temporarily disables tag processing. This is useful for generating content (eg, Mustache, Handlebars) which uses conflicting syntax.
{% raw %}
In Handlebars, {{ this }} will be HTML-escaped, but {{{ that }}} will not.
{% endraw %}
if / else
should be well-known from any other programming language.
Liquid allows you to write simple expressions in the if
or unless
(and
optionally, elsif
and else
) clause:
{% if user %}
Hello {{ user.name }}
{% endif %}
# Same as above
{% if user != null %}
Hello {{ user.name }}
{% endif %}
{% if user.name == 'tobi' %}
Hello tobi
{% elsif user.name == 'bob' %}
Hello bob
{% endif %}
{% if user.name == 'tobi' or user.name == 'bob' %}
Hello tobi or bob
{% endif %}
{% if user.name == 'bob' and user.age > 45 %}
Hello old bob
{% endif %}
{% if user.name != 'tobi' %}
Hello non-tobi
{% endif %}
# Same as above
{% unless user.name == 'tobi' %}
Hello non-tobi
{% endunless %}
# Check for the size of an array
{% if user.payments == empty %}
you never paid !
{% endif %}
{% if user.payments.size > 0 %}
you paid !
{% endif %}
{% if user.age > 18 %}
Login here
{% else %}
Sorry, you are too young
{% endif %}
# array = 1,2,3
{% if array contains 2 %}
array includes 2
{% endif %}
# string = 'hello world'
{% if string contains 'hello' %}
string includes 'hello'
{% endif %}
If you need more conditions, you can use the case
statement:
{% case condition %}
{% when 1 %}
hit 1
{% when 2 or 3 %}
hit 2 or 3
{% else %}
... else ...
{% endcase %}
Example:
{% case template %}
{% when 'label' %}
// {{ label.title }}
{% when 'product' %}
// {{ product.vendor | link_to_vendor }} / {{ product.title }}
{% else %}
// {{page_title}}
{% endcase %}
Often you have to alternate between different colors or similar tasks. Liquid
has built-in support for such operations, using the cycle
tag.
{% cycle 'one', 'two', 'three' %}
{% cycle 'one', 'two', 'three' %}
{% cycle 'one', 'two', 'three' %}
{% cycle 'one', 'two', 'three' %}
will result in
one
two
three
one
If no name is supplied for the cycle group, then it's assumed that multiple calls with the same parameters are one group.
If you want to have total control over cycle groups, you can optionally specify the name of the group. This can even be a variable.
{% cycle 'group 1': 'one', 'two', 'three' %}
{% cycle 'group 1': 'one', 'two', 'three' %}
{% cycle 'group 2': 'one', 'two', 'three' %}
{% cycle 'group 2': 'one', 'two', 'three' %}
will result in
one
two
one
two
Liquid allows for
loops over collections:
{% for item in array %}
{{ item }}
{% endfor %}
When iterating a hash, item[0]
contains the key, and item[1]
contains the value:
{% for item in hash %}
{{ item[0] }}: {{ item[1] }}
{% endfor %}
During every for
loop, the following helper variables are available for extra
styling needs:
forloop.length # => length of the entire for loop
forloop.index # => index of the current iteration
forloop.index0 # => index of the current iteration (zero based)
forloop.rindex # => how many items are still left?
forloop.rindex0 # => how many items are still left? (zero based)
forloop.first # => is this the first iteration?
forloop.last # => is this the last iteration?
There are several attributes you can use to influence which items you receive in your loop
limit:int
lets you restrict how many items you get.
offset:int
lets you start the collection with the nth item.
# array = [1,2,3,4,5,6]
{% for item in array limit:2 offset:2 %}
{{ item }}
{% endfor %}
# results in 3,4
Reversing the loop
{% for item in collection reversed %} {{item}} {% endfor %}
Instead of looping over an existing collection, you can define a range of numbers to loop through. The range can be defined by both literal and variable numbers:
# if item.quantity is 4...
{% for i in (1..item.quantity) %}
{{ i }}
{% endfor %}
# results in 1,2,3,4
A for loop can take an optional else
clause to display a block of text when there are no items in the collection:
# items => []
{% for item in items %}
{{ item.title }}
{% else %}
There are no items!
{% endfor %}
You can store data in your own variables, to be used in output or other tags as
desired. The simplest way to create a variable is with the assign
tag, which
has a pretty straightforward syntax:
{% assign name = 'freestyle' %}
{% for t in collections.tags %}{% if t == name %}
<p>Freestyle!</p>
{% endif %}{% endfor %}
Another way of doing this would be to assign true / false
values to the
variable:
{% assign freestyle = false %}
{% for t in collections.tags %}{% if t == 'freestyle' %}
{% assign freestyle = true %}
{% endif %}{% endfor %}
{% if freestyle %}
<p>Freestyle!</p>
{% endif %}
If you want to combine a number of strings into a single string and save it to
a variable, you can do that with the capture
tag. This tag is a block which
"captures" whatever is rendered inside it, then assigns the captured value to
the given variable instead of rendering it to the screen.
{% capture attribute_name %}{{ item.title | handleize }}-{{ i }}-color{% endcapture %}
<label for="{{ attribute_name }}">Color:</label>
<select name="attributes[{{ attribute_name }}]" id="{{ attribute_name }}">
<option value="red">Red</option>
<option value="green">Green</option>
<option value="blue">Blue</option>
</select>