Templates

Group-Office has a flexible template system supporting variables with filters and structural blocks. They are used for newsletters, reports, invoice templates etc.

Syntax

Variable instantiations

Assign

Our templating has very rudimentary variable assignment:

[assign mainFile = {{entity.files | first}}]

Configuration

If you work with PDF templates that are not in the main langugage, you can configure a number of formatting settings:

[config thousandsSeparator=.]
[config decimalSeparator=,]

Currently, the configurable settings and their default values are:

decimals (2)
decimalSeparator (.)
thousandsSeparator (,)
dateFormat (d-m-Y)

Control flows

Out of the box, two types of control flows are supported. Keywords and conditions must be surrounded by square brackets.

If - else

A typical if-statement looks like this:

[if {{entity.field}} == "<VALUE>"]
  <!-- Do something -->
[/if]

You can optianally fall back on a default with {{[else]}}:

[if {{entity.field}} == "<VALUE>"]
  <!-- Do something -->
[else]
  <!-- Do something else -->
[/fi]

Each in

Iterations are handled in each-loops, e.g.:

[each file in entity.files]
  <!-- do something with file -->
[/each]

The index of the array you are iterating through can be used or manipulated as well with the {{eachIndex}} variable:

<ul>
[each file in entity.files]
  <li>{{eachIndex}}: {{file.name}}</li>
[/each]
</ul>

Variables

By default some variables are already present:

{{now|date:Y-m-d}} The current date time object. In this example a date filter is used.

{{system.title}} The title configured at System Settings -> General

{{system.url}} The URL to Group-Office configured at System Settings -> General

{{:pnp:}} The current page number

{{:ptp:}} The total number of pages

A variable is written like this:

{{contact.name}}

Custom fields

A custom field can be accessed like this:

{{contact.customFields.<DATABASE_NAME_OF_CUSTOMFIELD>}}

Some custom fields are stored with an ID. Like a select field for example. You can get the text like this:

{{contact.customFields.asText.<DATABASE_NAME_OF_CUSTOMFIELD>}}

Arrays

Arrays can be written like this:

{{contact.emailAddresses[0].email}}

You can also iterate arrays using an [each] block:

[each address in contact.addresses]
  [if {{address.type}} == "billing"]
    {{address.formatted}}
  [/if]
[/each]

And filter arrays by property and only write first match using “eachIndex”:

[each emailAddress in contact.emailAddresses | filter:type:"billing"]
    [if {{eachIndex}} == 1]
        {{emailAddress.email}}
    [/if]
[/each]

Assign

But this is probably the best way to handle the case where you prefer a type of address but just use the first if that’s not found. It uses [assign] to create a new variable. If it’s empty it will use the first address:

[assign address = contact.addresses | filter:type:"postal" | first]
[if !{{address}}]
[assign address = contact.addresses | first]
[/if]
{{address.formatted}}

Finding a contact with id = 1 using the “entity” filter with parameter “Contact” (Available entities in your instance can be found in the core_entity database table):

[assign contact = 1 | entity:Contact]
{{contact.name}}

Find the first linked contact:

[assign firstContactLink = someEntityVar | links:Contact | first]
{{firstContactLink.name}}

Using [assign] to do some basic math

Note that inside the [each] block we access total with parent.total:

[assign total = 0]

[each invoice in invoices]
 <tr>
   <td>{{invoice.number}}</td>
   <td>{{invoice.date|date:d-m-Y}}</td>
   <td>{{invoice.expiresAt|date:d-m-Y}}</td>
   <td align="right">{{business.finance.currency}} {{invoice.totalPrice|number}}</td>
   <td align="right">{{business.finance.currency}} {{invoice.paidAmount|number}}</td>
   [assign balance = {{invoice.totalPrice}} - {{invoice.paidAmount}} ]
   [assign parent.total = {{parent.total}} + {{balance}}]
   <td align="right">{{business.finance.currency}} {{balance|number}}</td>
 </tr>
[/each]

{{business.finance.currency}} {{total|number}}

More examples

An advanced example for printing a custom salutation (Just an example. You can use {{contact.salutation}}):

Dear [if {{contact.prefixes}}]{{contact.prefixes}}[else][if !{{contact.gender}}]Ms./Mr.[else][if {{contact.gender}}=="M"]Mr.[else]Ms.[/if][/if][/if] {{contact.lastName}}

A simple example template:

Hi {{contact.salutation}},


Best regards,

{{creator.displayName}}
{{creator.profile.jobTitle}}
{{creator.profile.organizations[0].name}}
{{creator.profile.phoneNumbers | first | prop:number}}

Attachment field with photo’s in e-mail template:

[each photo in contact.customFields.Photos]
<h3>{{photo.name}}</h3>
<img src="{{photo.blobId|blobUrl}}" alt="{{photo.name|htmlEncode}}" style="max-width:100%"><hr>
[/each]

Or photo’s from the entity’s files folder:

[each photo in document|entityFiles]
<h3>{{photo.name}}</h3>
<img src="{{photo.blobId|blobUrl}}" alt="{{photo.name|htmlEncode}}" style="max-width:100%"><hr>
[/each]

Note

In PDF templates, use the {{blobPath}} filter if the {{blobUrl}} filter does not display an image file.

Filters

You can use filters to format or manipulate data. They can be used with a pipe sign (|) followed by the filter name. Optionally the filter can take arguments separated by a :.

date(format as in PHP):
```
{{contact.dates[0].date|date:d-m-Y}}
```
number(decimals,decimal separator,thousands separator:
```
{{contact.customFields.number|number:2:,:.}}
```

multiply(multiplier): Multiply a number:

{{contact.customFields.number|multiply:2}}

add(number): Add to a number:
```
{{contact.customFields.number|add:2}}
```
entity(type, id): Fetch an entity by ID:
```
[assign contact = 1 | entity:Contact]
```

links(entityName, properties (comma separated): gets the linked entities:

[assign firstContactLink = someEntityVar | links:Contact | first]

prop(property) get a property from an object or array by name:

[assign formattedAddress = contact.addresses | sort:type:"postal" | first | prop:formatted]

nl2br: Change line breaks to HTML <br> tags
empty: returns true if empty or false if not
dump: For debugging only. Dumps the variable type and value.

Arrays

filter(property, value): Filters the array by property values:
```
{{contact.addresses | filter:type:"postal" | first}}
```

sort(property, value?) or rsort:

[assign formattedAddress = contact.addresses | sort:type:"postal" | first | prop:formatted]
{{formattedAddress}}

count
first: Grab the first item of the array
prop(property): change the array to a sub property of all items.

implode(glue = ‘, ‘): Implode an array of strings:

{{contact.emailAddresses | prop:email | implode}}

newRow: useful when rendering tables. Check whether a new row should be started using a default modulo of 2.