First off - I am a MarionetteJS noob.
I am having trouble making an ItemView display a loading message or throbber while it is being fetched. This is especially problematic when this ItemView is being displayed from a deep link in Backbone's history (i.e. the ItemView is the first page of the app being displayed since the user linked directly to it). I want to indicate that the page is loading (fetching), preferably with a simple view, and then show the real templated view with the fetched model.
I have seen other answers on SO like Marionette.async, (which has been deprecated) and changing the template during ItemView.initalize().
Anybody (Derrick?) got any suggestions or best practices here?
UPDATE:
I am getting the model from the collection using collection.get(id), not using model.fetch() directly.
After thinking about this, the real question is where should this be implemented:
I could change my controller to see if the model exists in the collection (and if the collection is loaded) and decide which view to show accordingly. this seems like a lot of boilerplate everywhere since this could happen with any ItemView and any controller.
I could change my ItemView initialize to test for existence of the model (and a loaded collection), but same comment here: every ItemView could have this problem.
UPDATE 2:
This is what I ended up with, in case anybody else want this solution:
app.ModelLayout = Backbone.Marionette.Layout.extend({
constructor: function(){
var args = Array.prototype.slice.apply(arguments);
Backbone.Marionette.Layout.prototype.constructor.apply(this, args);
// we want to know when the collection is loaded or changed significantly
this.listenTo(this.collection, "reset sync", this.resetHandler);
},
resetHandler: function () {
// whenever the collection is reset/sync'ed, we try to render the selected model
if (this.collection.length) {
// when there is no model, check to see if the collection is loaded and then try to get the
// specified id to render into this view
this.model = this.collection.get(this.id);
}
this.render();
},
getTemplate: function(){
// getTemplate will be called during render() processing.
// return a template based on state of collection, and state of model
if (this.model){
// normal case: we have a valid model, return the normal template
return this.template;
} else if (this.collection && this.collection.isSyncing) {
// collection is still syncing, tell the user that it is Loading
return this.loadingView;
} else {
// we're not syncing and we don't have a model, therefore, not found
return this.emptyView;
}
}
});
And here is how to use it:
// display a single model on a page
app.Access.Layout.CardLayout = app.ModelLayout.extend({
regions: {
detailsRegion:"#detailsRegion",
eventsRegion:"#eventsRegion"
},
template:"CardLayout", // this is the normal template with a loaded model
loadingView:"LoadingView", // this is a template to show while loading the collection
emptyView:"PageNotFoundView", // this is a template to show when the model is not found
onRender : function() {
this.detailsRegion.show( blah );
this.eventsRegion.show( blah );
}
});
thanks!
For the ItemView
I think you can add a spinner in your initialize function, I really like spin.js http://fgnass.github.io/spin.js/ because its pretty easy and simple to use, and you can hide the spinner in the onRender function of the Itemview
For The CollectionView
in the CollectionView you could handle it like this....
Take a look at the solution that Derick posted..
https://github.com/marionettejs/backbone.marionette/wiki/Displaying-A-%22loading-...%22-Message-For-A-Collection-Or-Composite-View
I'd suggest using jQuery deferreds:
Start fetching your data, and store the return value (which is a jQuery promise)
Instanciate your content view
Show your loading view
When the promise is done, show the view containing the content
I've talked about implementing this technique on my blog:
http://davidsulc.com/blog/2013/04/01/using-jquery-promises-to-render-backbone-views-after-fetching-data/
http://davidsulc.com/blog/2013/04/02/rendering-a-view-after-multiple-async-functions-return-using-promises/
The issue with the solution linked by Rayweb_on, is that your loading view will be displayed any time your collection is empty (i.e. not just when it's being fetched). Besides, the ItemView doesn't have an emptyView attribute, so it won't be applicable to your case anyway.
Update:
Based on your updated question, you should still be able to apply the concept by dynamically specifying which template to use: https://github.com/marionettejs/backbone.marionette/blob/master/docs/marionette.view.md#change-which-template-is-rendered-for-a-view
Then, when/if the data has been fetched successfully, trigger a rerender in the view.
Related
Usually I have a View on which I set listeners to model-changes, like so (conflated):
var jsonModel = {bla: 'interesting stuff'}; //some model in json, probably rendered in a dom-element and passed from the server to the client
var someModelType = Backbone.RelationalModel.extend({
bla: "String"
});
var someModelInstance = new someModelType(jsonModel);
var someViewType = Backbone.View.extend({
initialize: function(){
this.listenTo(this.model,'change:bla', function(model){
//update view to sync with model change here
}
}
});
var someViewInstance = new someViewType({
model: someModelInstance
});
I'm looking for the preferred / backbone - way of bootstrapping the view, i.e: I want my view (form fields or what have you) to be synced with the model on creation. With the above this is impossible since the model is created before the view is attached, which results in model-updates/changes to be fired before listeners from the view were initialized.
Of course I could code some custom bootstapping logic which would call the listener-functions manually, but since this must be such a common problem, I'm looking on some best practice advice, or even better, a Backbone-switch I need to set to get this to work.
This will sound silly, but what I usually do is do a render() after the view creation.
For me, the whole point of the change event is to notify of a change. The fact that it's triggered also on creation (as a "changed compared to the default") is more a side effect than anything deep...
In that sense, when I create the views, and give it an existing model, I expect the model to be somewhat ready and so I should be able to do a render() right away. So my bootstrapping code would be more like:
var someViewInstance = new someViewType({
model: someModelInstance
});
someViewInstance.render()
Or do it in the initialize() after bindings if you feel adventurous (I personally don't like that because when dealing with subviews, it's hard to know exactly when you want the render to happen, especially when dependent on libraries who need the DOM to be ready, and can't work on detached nodes).
So to sum up, although your problem is common, to me, it doesn't need any kind of complex solution: you have a render() function to transform your model into DOM-stuff, your model may or may not be ready but it exists, so you pass it to the view, and you do the first rendering after creating the view, manually, because you know it needs to happen. Then you bind to changes, in case your model is updated, to update the DOM accordingly.
side note: in case of a collection of models, when the Model isn't ready at ALL, then it probably shouldn't even have an instance, and you should let the Collection give you some add/remove events for when it pops into existence.
I'm new to Backbone and I don't fully understand it yet, and I've come across a situation I can't find any documentation on. What I if I have a view that contains multiple views? For example, I have a view called StackView. The purpose of this view is to neatly lay out a set of cards. It manages the animation of adding, removing, and adjusting cards in the stack. Each card is a CardView. How would I handle this? I've seen people talk about views within views by simple creating a variable in the view and assigning the View instance to that variable. Should I just be adding an array of CardViews in a variable of a StackView?
That's what I do, and it works well. Here's a snippet of a View I use in an application. I've re-written it back into regular javascript from my coffeescript, so I apologize for any typos:
render: function() {
var _this = this;
this.$el.html(this.template());
this.listItemViews = [];
// for each model in the collection, create a new sub-view and add
// it to the parent view
this.collection.each(function(model){
var view = new App.Views.Projects.ListItem({model:model}); // create the new sub-view
_this.listItemViews.push(view); // add it to the array
_this.$('#project-table tbody').append(view.render().$el); // append its rendered element to the parent view's DOM
});
return this;
}
This lets my Table view maintain a reference to all the listItemView views.
Of course, if you do this, you should make sure to properly remove these child views and unbind any events when you remove the parent view.
I've got a backbone view for an entire collection (a list of "clickable" categories). Can I delegate events on each item of the view so that I can find which category has been clicked?
Here's a post that might help. Basically you use a data-* attribute in the item view to store and then retrieve the id of item clicked:
Backbone.js: Getting The Model For A Clicked Element
If you'd rather go directly to code, here's the jsFiddle that's used in the post to demonstrate. Hope that helps.
I have no answer for your question (no, I think), but would like to share my approach: a general collection view component, which renders a collection using other view. It can be as simple as in the example below or more sophisticated (listening add/remove/reset events and react accordingly).
var CollectionView = Backbone.View.extend({
render : function() {
this.options.collection.each(function(model) {
this.$el.append((new this.options.view({model : model})).el);
}, this);
}
})
I've got a backbonejs application with two view. It kind of looks like this:
<body>
<header></header>
<div id="content"></div>
</body>
Every time a view is loaded the app overwrites the current view by completely overwriting the contents of #content.
// Like this...
$('#content').html( new primaryView().render() );
// ...and this.
$('#content').html( new secondaryView().render() );
The application has a global collection.
App.Collection();
The secondary view modifies itself depending on the global collection. Therefor it binds a function to the 'add' event' on App.Collection in the views initialize function;
App.Collection.bind('add', function(){
console.log('Item added');
});
Which result in my problem. Every time the secondary view is loaded a new function is binded to App.Collection's add event. If I go from the primary view to the secondary view three times, the function will fire three times everytime an item is added to App.Collection.
What am I doing wrong?
I can see how I would do it if there was an uninitialize function on views.
I can see how I could do it if I never removed a view once it was loaded.
I can see how I would do it if I could namespace events like in Jquery. (by unbinding before binding).
You can generalize your problem quite a bit. Basically, you are writing an event-driven app, and in such app events should be taken care of.
Check out this post to see a recommended way to work with event handlers in backbone.
Depending on the situation, you can use initialize and render methods to handle different aspects of creating a view. For instance, you can put your binding inside the initialize
initialize: function() {
App.Collection.bind('add', function(){
this.view.render()
});
}
which only fires when the view is created. This binds your render method to the add event. Then in your render method you can actually create the html.
This prevents the binding from happening every time you need to re-render.
I have a simple backbone.js app. I want to render a view into the DOM of the HTML page, this view is a detail view for a model. My HTML page already has the DIV element that I want to render the view into. If I try to render my view like this:
detailView = new RulesPanelView({model : #model})
$("#detail").html(detailView.render().el)
It fails and I get [Object HTMLDivElement] inserted into the DOM, not my rendered HTML.
This is the only way I can get it to work and it seems like a hack:
$("#detail").html('')
detailView = new RulesPanelView({model : #model})
$("#detail").append(detailView.render().el)
Having to empty the HTML of the DIV before rendering so I don't get multiple views rendered inside #detail which is what would happend with append.
Also aren't I creating way too many views this way, just seems cleaner to replace the HTML as in the first code segment?
What is the correct way to render this view?
What you want is to pass the already inserted DOM node to the view as a 'el' option to the constructor:
new RulesPanelView({el: $("#detail")});
This way, it won't render again. You still need to make sure your view's 'render' method will be able to render a correct view from an updated model, though.
The backbone documentation mentions this as a good way to avoid rendering too much stuff at once.
I actually append in the render method of the view. This doesn't work if you want to re-render when models change - but for that I've added a refresh method that render actually calls before appending. I then bind the refresh to the model change (if I need that). So in my View, I do this:
render: function(){
var markup = this.refresh();
$(markup).appendTo('#some-selector');
return this;
},
refresh: function(){
return $(this.el).html($.mustache(this.template, this.model.toJSON()));
},
Not sure if that's the "best", but I think it works pretty well. I've also seen where you have a collection bound to a view that loops through all of the models and renders "sub-views" of the collection view - this provides a nicer programmatic approach than hard-coding where you're going to append.