This project is based on the core idea of Zen Coding, which is to use standard CSS Search Strings to create HTML. However, the language of what was "CSS Search Strings" has been significantly modified so that it can operate as a powerful templating engine using jQuery to do all DOM manipulations.
$.zc(ZenCode) - returns the HTML string represented by the ZenCode string
$.zc(ZenObject) - returns the HTML string represented by the ZenObject.main while using the rest of ZenObject for references.
$.zc(ZenCode, data) - return the HTML string represented by the ZenCode template using the given data.
$.zc(ZenObject, data) - Same as $.zc(ZenObject) except that it also references data for javascript parsing.
Please refer to the wiki for examples. Further language specifications are below.
Element - A DOM Element.
Tag - String representation of an Element type (e.i. div, span, a, etc.)
ZenCode - A string formatted in the language specified below to represent a template of the HTML Element(s) to be created.
ZenObject - A JavaScript object representating one or more ZenCode(s). Every ZenObject must specify a ZenCode in "main".
data - An optional JavaScript object or array sent with the ZenObject
data.functions - An optional JavaScript object defining functions.
E - E is a Tag which will be created into an Element
E#id - id is the string ID of E. If E is not defined, E is assumed to be "div".
E.class - class is the string class name of a class of E. If E is not defined, E is assumed to be "div".
E>E2 - E2 is the child of E
E+E2 - E2 is a sibling of E
E[attr] - attr is a blank attribute of E
E[attr="value"] - attr is an attribute with value value of E
E{value} - value is assigned as the contents of E. If E is not definded, E is assumed to be "span".
(E...) - group one or more Tags
E~event - event is the string representation of an event of E which is associated with function event in data
E~event=fn - event is the string representation of an event of E which is associated with function fn in data
E&data - data is the string of an object within data to be mapped to E as data via $.data(data,data)
E&data=reference - reference is the string of an object within data to be mapped to E as data via $.data(data,reference)
@reference - When using a ZenObject M, reference should be a string representation of a ZenCode N within M which will replace the @reference in the running ZenCode.
!js! - The value returned by executing js will replace !js! in the ZenCode
!if:js!E - Creates E only if the restult returned by executing js is not undefined, null, or flase.
!for:var!E - If var is a string matching an object in data, then N number of E are created using var as data where N is the number of elements in var.
!for:index:var!E - If var is a string matching an object in data, then N number of E are created using var as data and a new accessable object with the same name as the string index where N is the number of elements in var.