What is Core Templating Engine?
The Shift4Shop Core Templating Engine is a new approach to building custom themes for Shift4Shop stores. Theme design has been broken down into building blocks that make it easy to put together the theme you have in mind. This guide will serve as your instructions and reference for using the Core Templating Engine to build your own themes. We decided on this modular approach because we wanted to build something that has the flexibility to create any layout a designer can think of, without the system restricting a developer on what they would be able to produce. We also wanted to be forward-thinking and creative with our themes that we provide to our customers. We feel this will allow us to provide them with new, fresh themes to show off their website.
The Modular Approach to Theme Building
This is the premise of our new approach to creating a Shift4Shop theme from the ground up. Shift4Shop code blocks are used to enable or disable a section, and variables are used throughout the cart and on certain templates. Many of the code blocks and variables that were previously available only for frame.html templates are now available to be used in most other templates too. Theme design centers around the usage of these components. Code blocks are primarily managed through the Shift4Shop admin panel when you enable or disable certain page sections, but they can also be triggered based on the availability of content for that area.
Each page of a Shift4Shop website refers to multiple template pages depending on the settings you have activated in the Shift4Shop Online Store Builder. When you enable a feature on a page, the Shift4Shop software pulls the information from that feature’s template page in order to display it on your site. For example, if you activate the left sidebar for your store’s design, it displays based on information found in the corresponding template page— in this case, leftbar.html is the file in question.
The modular nature of the Shift4Shop Core Templating Engine allows you to make changes to individual parts of your site as you see fit, even resulting in a complete overhaul, with complete freedom. In this guide, you will find a full explanation of every template and all the code blocks and variables used. You will also learn how and when to use these building blocks to achieve the look and feel you want for your Shift4Shop website.
Integration of Bootstrap
The new template system comes integrated with the most popular front-end framework, Bootstrap. This will allow front-end developers to develop templates more quickly and easily using the power of Bootstrap.