shortcodes.js

shortcodes.js v1.0.1

Shortcodes.js is a completely front-end solution that uses sequences of DOM elements for templating dynamic and beautiful layouts while preserving SEO where backend development is limited, e.g. Shopify.

Being completely frontend solution means there will be some CLS, or the page will flicker on initial load, but it's a small price to pay for the flexibility and ease of use.

DEMO HERE ⤻

How it works?

Shortcodes.js works by interpreting sequences of different text formatting, set in WYSIWYG editor, under the shortcode tag, predefined for each tag via provided binding descriptor and it's respective HTML template.

For example, a simple marquee shortcode will interpret an H1 (Header size 1) as a title of the marque and an image inserted into the text as a background image.

Binding Descriptor

The binding descriptor is a set of instructions on what sequence to expect and how to perform the binding of the HTML template. It is the second parameter of the shortcode.register() function, being that the first parameter is the name of the shortcode.

TODO: basic code setup and demo in action

Work in progress!

Sample descriptor

Unfortunately this descriptor example is only for me to navigate the code and remember what is what, before I write the documentation and demos.

I know my nomenclature and logic can be confusing sometimes, since it's confusing even for myself sometimes. So the work on this piece of code will be simplification through refactoring. NOTE: Descriptor nomenclature might change with every major release.

var example_descriptor = {
    template: 'section.carousel',
    anchor: '.carousel-landing', // or "self" if you use a closing tag for shortcode this will inject the shortcode at the place it was found
    item_template: '.slide.section-carousel',
    item_anchor: '.slides-landing',
	pre: function(shortcode_obj) {/*...*/}, //callback before templating
	attribute_parsers: {custom: function(shortcode_obj, value){} /*...*/}, //additional attribute parsing methods, see Shortcodes.prototype.parseAttributes. This example will trigger a function for any attribute starting with "custom-"
	callback: function(template, shortcode_obj) {/*...*/}, //callback after templating is complete, with arguments sufficient for doing some manual additional programming
    bind_fn: 'append', // jquery function html, text, append, before, prepend or custom function with arguments (extract, $dest, props, descriptor)
    elements: {
        'img': {
            count: 'many',
            bind_extracted: function(destination, extracted, properties, shortcode_obj, num) {
                // console.log('whoa');
            },
            extract: ['src', 'alt'], //if extract is attr you need to provide which attr, can be string or array
            anchor: '.image-landing',
            anchor_element: 'item'
        },
        'h1, h2, h3, h4': {
            count: 'many', // count = 'many' or num
            bind_extracted: 'html', // jquery function html, text, append, before, prepend, or custom function
            extract: 'html', // jquery function html, text, self, attr or custom function
            anchor: '.title-landing', // where on element should it land
            anchor_element: 'item', // item or template or anchor (to the selected element)
        },
        'rest': { //rest items are used
            extract: 'self',
            bind_extracted: 'append',
            anchor: '.rest-landing',
            anchor_element: 'item'
        }
    }
};

shortcodes.register('example', example_descriptor); //will register [example] shortcode based on provided descriptor, which contains all the infromation required for parsing DOM and templates with the instructions for templating.