Hyperscript.jl

Hyperscript: A lightweight DOM representation for Julia
Popularity
101 Stars
Updated Last
1 Month Ago
Started In
December 2017

Hyperscript

Hyperscript is a package for working with HTML, SVG, and CSS in Julia.

When using this library you automatically get:

  • A concise DSL for writing HTML, SVG, and CSS.
  • Flexible ways to combine DOM pieces together into larger components.
  • Safe and automatic HTML-escaping.
  • Lightweight and optional support for scoped CSS.
  • Lightweight and optional support for CSS unit arithmetic.

Usage

Hyperscript introduces the m function for creating markup nodes:

m("div", class="entry",
    m("h1", "An Important Announcement"))

Nodes can be used as a templates:

const div = m("div")
const h1 = m("h1")
div(class="entry", h1("An Important Announcement"))

Dot syntax is supported for setting class attributes:

const div = m("div")
const h1 = m("h1")
div.entry(h1("An Important Announcement"))

Chained dot calls turn into multiple classes:

m("div").header.entry

The convenience macro @tags can be used to quickly declare common tags:

@tags div h1
const entry = div.entry
entry(h1("An Important Announcement"))

Arrays, tuples, and generators are recursively flattened, linearizing nested structures for display:

@tags div h1
const entry = div.entry
div(entry.(["$n Fast $n Furious" for n in 1:10])) # joke © Glen Chiacchieri

Attribute names with hyphens can be written using camelCase:

m("meta", httpEquiv="refresh")
# turns into <meta http-equiv="refresh" />

For attributes that are meant to be camelCase, Hyperscript still does the right thing:

m("svg", viewBox="0 0 100 100")
# turns into <svg viewBox="0 0 100 100"><svg>

Attribute names that happen to be Julia keywords can be specified with :attr => value syntax:

m("input"; :type => "text")
# turns into <input type="text" />

Hyperscript automatically HTML-escapes children of DOM nodes:

m("p", "I am a paragraph with a < inside it")
# turns into <p>I am a paragraph with a &#60; inside it</p>

You can disable escaping using @tags_noescape for writing an inline style or script:

@tags_noescape script
script("console.log('<(0_0<) <(0_0)> (>0_0)> KIRBY DANCE')")

Nodes can be printed compactly with print or show, or pretty-printed by wrapping a node in Pretty:

node = m("div", class="entry", m("h1", "An Important Announcement"))

print(node)
# <div class="entry"><h1>An Important Announcement</h1></div>

print(Pretty(node))
# <div class="entry">
#  <h1>An Important Announcement</h1>
# </div>

Note that the extra white space can affect layout, particularly in conjunction with CSS properties like white-space.

Vectors of nodes can be written as an html-file using the savehtml function. Here's an example:

@tags head meta body h1 h2 ul li

doc = [
    head(
      meta(charset="UTF-8"),
      ),
    body(
         [
          h1("My title"),
             "Some text",
             h2("A list"),
             ul(li.(["First point", "Second Point"]))
         ] )
];

savehtml("/tmp/hyper.html", doc);

read("/tmp/hyper.html", String)
# <!doctype html>
# <html><head><meta charset="UTF-8" /></head><body><h1>My title</h1>Some text<h2>A list</h2><ul><li>First point</li><li>Second Point</li></ul></body></html>

CSS

In addition to HTML and SVG, Hyperscript also supports CSS:

css(".entry", fontSize="14px")
# turns into .entry { font-size: 14px; }

CSS nodes can be nested inside each other:

css(".entry",
    fontSize="14px",
    css("h1", textDecoration="underline"),
    css("> p", color="#999"))
# turns into
# .entry { font-size: 14px; }
# .entry h1 { text-decoration: underline; }
# .entry > p { color: #999; }

@media queries are also supported:

css("@media (min-width: 1024px)",
    css("p", color="red"))
# turns into
# @media (min-width: 1024px) {
#   p { color: red; }
# }

Scoped Styles

Hyperscript supports scoped styles. They are implemented by adding unique attributes to nodes and selecting them via attribute selectors:

@tags p
@tags_noescape style

# Create a scoped `Style` object
s1 = Style(css("p", fontWeight="bold"), css("span", color="red"))

# Apply the style to a DOM node
s1(p("hello"))
# turns into <p v-style1>hello</p>

# Insert the corresponding styles into a <style> tag
style(styles(s1))
# turns into
# <style>
#   p[v-style1] {font-weight: bold;}
#   span[v-style1] {color: red;}
# </style>

Scoped styles are scoped to the DOM subtree where they are applied. Styled nodes function as cascade barriers — parent styles do not leak into styled child nodes:

# Create a second scoped style
s2 = Style(css("p", color="blue"))

# Apply `s1` to the parent and `s2` to a child.
# Note the `s1` style does not apply to the child styled with `s2`.
s1(p(p("outer"), s2(p("inner"))))
# turns into
# <p v-style1>
#   <p v-style1>outer</p>
#   <p v-style2>inner</p>
# </p>

style(styles(s1), styles(s2))
# turns into
# <style>
#   p[v-style1] {font-weight: bold;}
#   span[v-style1] {color: red;}
#   p[v-style2] {color: blue;}
# </style>

CSS Units

Hyperscript supports a concise syntax for CSS unit arithmetic:

using Hyperscript

css(".foo", width=50px)
# turns into .foo {width: 50px;}

css(".foo", width=50px + 2 * 100px)
# turns into .foo {width: 250px;}

css(".foo", width=(50px + 50px) + 2em)
# turns into .foo {width: calc(100px + 2em);}

Supported units are px, pt, em,vh, vw, vmin, vmax, and pc for percent.


I'd like to create a more comprehensive guide to the full functionality available in Hyperscript at some point. For now here's a list of some of the finer points:

  • Nodes are immutable — any derivation of new nodes from existing nodes will leave existing nodes unchanged.
  • Calling an existing node with with more children creates a new node with the new children appended.
  • Calling an existing node with more attributes creates a new node whose attributes are the merge of the existing and new attributes.
  • div.fooBar adds the CSS class foo-bar. To add the camelCase class fooBar you can use the dot syntax with a string: div."fooBar"
  • The dot syntax always adds to the CSS class. This is why chaining (div.foo.bar.baz) adds all three classes in sequence.
  • Tags defined with @tags_noescape only "noescape" one level deep. Children of children will still be escaped according to their own rules.
  • Using nothing as the value of a DOM attribute creates a valueless attribute, e.g. <input checked />.

Required Packages

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