Templates
Templating in Umbraco builds on the concept of Razor Views from ASP.NET MVC.
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Templating in Umbraco builds on the concept of Razor Views from ASP.NET MVC.
Last updated
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Templates are the files that control the look and feel of the frontend of your Umbraco websites. Building on the concept of MVC Razor Views, template files enable you to structure your websites using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. When tied to a Document Type, templates are used to render your Umbraco content on the frontend.
You can manage and work with your templates directly from the Settings section in the Umbraco backoffice. Each Template can also be found as a cshtml file in the Views folder in your project directory.
When building an Umbraco website you can automatically generate Templates when you create a new Document Type. This will ensure the connection between the two and you can jump straight from defining the content to structuring it.
Choose the option called Document Type with Template when you create a new Document Type to automatically create a Template as well.
In some cases, you might want to create independent Templates that don't have a direct connection to a Document Type. You can follow the steps below to create a new blank Template:
Go to the Settings section inside the Umbraco backoffice.
Click ... next to the Templates folder.
Choose Create.
Enter a template name.
Click the Save button.
You will now see the default template markup in the backoffice template editor.
To use a Template on your content, you must first allow it on the content Document Type.
Open the Document Type you want to use the template.
Open the Templates Workspace View.
Select your Template under the Allowed Templates section.
A Template can inherit content from a "Master Template". This is done by using the ASP.NET views Layout feature.
Let's say you have a Template called MainView, containing the following HTML:
This file contains the structural HTML tags for your website.
By using the Template as the "Master Template" on your other Templates, you can ensure that they inherit the same structural HTML.
Follow these steps to use a Template file as a Master Template:
Open one of your Template files.
Select the Master template: No master button above the editor.
Select the Template that should be defined as the Master Template.
Click Choose.
Alternatively, you can manually change the value of the Layout variable in the Template using the name of the Template file.
The updated markup will look something like the snippet below and the Template is now referred to as a Child Template:
When a page that uses a Template with a Master Template defined is rendered, the HTML of the two templates is merged.
The code from the Template replaces the @RenderBody() tag in the Master Template. Following the examples above, the final HTML will look like the code in the snippet below:
Template Sections give you added flexibility when building your templates. Use the Template Section together with a Master Template setup, to decide where sections of content are placed.
If a Child Template needs to add code to the <head> tag a Section must be defined and then used in the Master Template. This is made possible by Named Sections.
The following steps will guide you through defining and using a Named Section:
Open your Template.
Select the Sections option.
Choose Define a named section.
Give the section a name and click Submit.
The following code will be added to your Template:
Add your code between the curly brackets.
Save the changes.
Open the Master Template.
Choose a spot for the section and set the cursor there.
Select the Sections option.
Choose Render a named section.
Enter the name of the section you want to add.
Click Submit.
For instance, if you want to be able to add HTML to your <head> tags, you would add the tag there:
You can decide whether a section should be mandatory or not. Making a section mandatory means that any template using the Master Template is required to have the section defined.
Keep in mind that whenever a mandatory named section is missing, it will result in errors on your website.
To make the section mandatory, you have two options:
Add true to the code tag: @RenderSection("SectionName", true).
Check the Section is mandatory field when using the Sections dialog in the backoffice.
Another way to reuse HTML is to use partial views - which are small reusable views that can be injected into another view.
Like templates, you can create a partial view, by clicking ... next to the Partial Views folder and selecting Create. You can then either create an empty partial view or a partial view from a snippet.
The created partial view can now be injected into any template by using the @Html.Partial() method like so:
