EJS

EJS stands for Embedded JavaScript, which describes it well: it is essentially HTML with JavaScript-based features embedded for templating. This lets you use iterate over your flexible metadata, include partials, and more.

Why?

EJS is familiar, as it’s primarily HTML, but with additional features that allow you to efficiently reuse pieces of your project. If you have an existing HTML project, all you have to do is rename the file with the .ejs extension, and you can start using any of EJS’ features.

Jade, a different HTML preprocessor, also works especially well with Harp if you’d like to give it a try.

Usage

Harp’s Asset Pipeline is super easy to use. All the processing happens implicitly, so there is nothing to setup. Just name your file with an .ejs extension rather than .html, and Harp will see it as if it is an .html file.

Example

This project contains an index.ejs and an about.ejs file in the root directory.

myproject/
  |- index.ejs
  +- about.ejs

Both index.ejs and about.ejs will be seen as an .html file. So, requests to the following paths will all work:

  • /
  • /index
  • /index.html
  • /about
  • /about.html

Harp's compile step will also export the files as index.html and about.html.

Managing File Extension

You may find yourself wanting to create another, markup-based file other than .html using EJS. No problem: just prefix .ejs with the extension of your choice. For example, feed.xml.ejs will be served by Harp as feed.xml instead.

Also see