The Tramp

Chaplin.js on Node.js. Use it for SEO or just because you can ;)

Project Status

Pre-Alpha.

It is currently being tested in a Chaplin app. The following work:

• Controllers
• Models (including validation w/ Backbone.validation)
• Views & Sub-views
• Handlebars templates & helpers
• Routes
• Common.js modules using Chaplin's loader

Need to implement:

• Composition
• CollectionView
• Handlebars Partials (they might work, just haven't tested at all)
• Sub-views that were not marked as DualViews (so they will be rendered on client-side on if they were a part of the initial view)
• Require/AMD support

How it works

An express app is created on Node and then the Tramp is required. It's designed to be a drop in plugin, but at the moment there are a few changes that have to be made to the Chaplin app:

Loader

Internally, Chaplin uses loader instead of the word require for loading modules. In order to get the modules to load in the browser & Node and not change the app's build process, it is necessary to change all instances of require in the app to loader. The behavior is the same; it is just a syntax change.

Template Helpers

In application.coffee a new property needs to be created: templateHelpers. This is an array with the path to each template helper file. Each template helper file now needs to have:

module.exports = (Handlebars) ->

as the Handlebars object that express uses is tied to hbs.handlebars and as such needs to be passed into each template when they are required.

Views

Views have a new class called "DualView" which simply marks this view as being eligable for rendered on Node. If a view is not a DualView, the Tramp will skip it. The same goes for subviews.