silverstripe: use another "root" - template instead of "Page.ss"

Question

Is it possible to render another "root" template instead of the Page.ss file for some specific pages / controllers? There are already some pages using the Page.ss template, but now there will be a new "Intranet" section on the website where the pages should have another "root" template: IntranetPage.ss.

Page.ss should stay as is and should not be touched at all.

I mainly want different "root" templates because both templates load different JS and CSS files. Also the "container" HTML is quite different.

I was able to create a custom controller which does manually what I need. Something like this:

class IntranetPageController extends PageController
{
    public function index()
    {
        return $this->customise([
            'Layout' => $this->renderWith(['Intranet/Layout/IntranetPageLayout'])
        ])->renderWith(['Intranet/IntranetPage']);
    }
}

The code is inspired from here: https://docs.silverstripe.org/en/4/developer_guides/templates/rendering_templates/

IntranetPage.ss is used now as the "root" template. IntranetPageLayout.ss is displayed for the $Layout placeholder.

That seems to work, however I have many pages which have to be based on IntranetPage.ss. It feels strange to write for every new Controller the very same index function (with a small adjustment to load another LayoutPage).

I am sure, Silverstripe has some convention to do that automatically :)

What I need is very close to having a individual theme per page, but I am not sure if that is possible...

Are you not going to leave this index function in IntranetPageController and then for every new Controller define as class NewIntranetPageController extends IntranetPageController? meaning it's written once and ever page that extends it will use it automatically — Barry

lyxt lyxt · Accepted Answer · 2021-07-09T06:14:36

Instead of extending PageController, extend your IntranetPageController in new controllers. Whenever index is called, it will call your index function from your parent class, in your case IntranetPageController.

silverstripe: use another "root" - template instead of "Page.ss"

1 Answers