Usage

July 15, 2025 · View on GitHub

Doctype

TrimTemplate understands multiple DOCTYPEs as shorthand, as below:

doctype html
  <!DOCTYPE html>

doctype strict
  <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
    "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">

doctype frameset
  <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Frameset//EN"
    "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-frameset.dtd">

doctype mobile
  <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//WAPFORUM//DTD XHTML Mobile 1.2//EN"
    "http://www.openmobilealliance.org/tech/DTD/xhtml-mobile12.dtd">

doctype basic
  <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML Basic 1.1//EN"
    "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml-basic/xhtml-basic11.dtd">

doctype transitional
  <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
    "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

Closed tags

TrimTemplate automatically closes tags for you, thus:

img src='/something.png'
p some text

render to:

<img src='/something/png'/>
<p>some text</p>

Whitespace

You can add whitespace before or after text in a tag using < and >.

span< hello will output  hello span> hello will output hello  span<> hello will output  hello 

Variables

TrimTemplate uses variable interpolation that is recognisable to any Python developer.

span {user.first_name}

This also works with attributes

a href={home_path}

Controls

`if` and `else` conditionals

- if some_condition
  p render if true
- else
  p render if false

Looping

You can iterate over arrays with the for syntax.

ul
  - for name in names
    li {name}

Comments

You can add comments to a TrimTemplate file, they will be ignored at render time

/ show the main menu
div#menu

You can also add HTML comments:

/! render an HTML comment

which renders to

<!-- render an HTML comment -->

Attributes

ID attribute shortcut

While you can write div id='menu', it's shorter to simply write div#menu

Classes shortcut

You can write button class='btn btn-primary' but it's simpler to write button.btn.btn-primary

Boolean attributes

Boolean attributes, such as used on form inputs, are made easier:

input type='text' disabled=True
input type='checkbox' name='newsletter' checked={user.preferences.newsletter}

Embedding

Embedded Javascript

There's no need to write a script tag for your embedded javascript. Just write:

javascript:
  console.log('this will be rendered in a script tag');

Embedded CSS

No need to write a style tag, simply write:

css:
    h1 { color: 'green'; }

Sub-templates

You can include other templates into a template, for example you can create a layout for your site something like this:

/ layout.html.trim

doctype html
body
  header
    - render 'navbar.html.trim'
  #content
    - if logged_in
      aside
        - render 'sidebar.html.trim'
      - render content_page
    - else
      - render 'paywall_instructions.html.trim'