> I never knew there was an "original" freemarker project. See https://freemarker.apache.org/history.html
On Thu, Nov 9, 2023 at 9:00 PM Benjamin Marwell <bmarw...@apache.org> wrote: > I never knew there was an "original" freemarker project. > Your web site is down, the documentation on the GitHub project is sparse. > There is no way to tell whether it really is more advanced or not. > > It can never be on Maven central, because the namespace (groupid) > "freemarker" is already claimed by Apache Freemarker. > > - Ben > > Am Do., 9. Nov. 2023 um 18:40 Uhr schrieb Taher Alkhateeb > <ta...@pythys.com.invalid>: > > > > > > I'm a little confused. Why aren't we joining efforts on the apache > version? Why make it "a pity if a wider group of > > people never get the benefit of this work"? Am I missing something too > obvious or too old or something? Is this code base completely incompatible? > Is this a technical issue? > > > > Taher Alkhateeb > > > > On Wednesday, November 08, 2023 04:03 +03, Jonathan Revusky < > revu...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Greetings, > > > > I thought to let people know that there is a vastly more advanced version > > of FreeMarker available here: https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3 > > > > You can build it via: > > > > git clone https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3.git > > cd freemarker3 > > ant > > > > Or, if you want, there is a prebuilt jarfile you can grab here: > > https://parsers.org/download/freemarker.jar > > > > Though it is actually a rather superficial new feature, I think that one > > thing that people will enjoy is the new terser syntax. Basically, if a > > directive starts a line (aside from whitespace) there is no need for any > > pointy (or square) brackets. So you can just write: > > > > #if foo == bar > > blah blah > > /#if > > > > You can look here for a more complete description: > > https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3/wiki/Terse-Syntax and here is > an > > example of a template from the old test suite rewritten using the terser > > syntax: > > > https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3/blob/master/src/freemarker/testcase/template/test-switch.html > > > > In this version of FreeMarker, the #assign and #local directives (though > > they still work in a backward-compatible mode) were replaced with the > newer > > #var and #set. This is (IMHO) a significant improvement and is described > > here: https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3/wiki/Strict-Vars > > > > Just generally speaking though, the biggest changes are really under the > > hood and would not be so visible to the casual user. This FreeMarker > > codebase has been refactored so that it largely does away with all of > those > > TemplateXXXModel wrappers and mostly just directly uses POJOs. (Plain Old > > Java Objects.) This is described here: > > https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3/wiki/Under-the-Hood > > > > Various longstanding annoyances, like not being able to directly use a > map > > with non-string keys, have been addressed. > > > > Oh, it suddenly occurs to me that many (perhaps most) people on this > > mailing list do not know who I am. I am effectively the original author > of > > FreeMarker. I say "effectively" because there was a FreeMarker 1.x, which > > was really little more than a weekend hack. The version that 99% of > > FreeMarker users have used, which is 2.x, was a complete rewrite and is > > largely my work. > > > > As for other questions about what is going on with this, for example, > why I > > have put some renewed effort into FreeMarker after all years... well, my > > main open source efforts have been going into my rewrite of that old > JavaCC > > parser generator that FreeMarker 2.x was originally built with. The new > > version of JavaCC was originally called FreeCC, then when I resuscitated > it > > a few years ago, I called it JavaCC 21, but it is now rebranded as > CongoCC. > > So, since FreeMarker is a key part of CongoCC, I found myself adding the > > occasional new feature to FreeMarker (my own version, not Apache > > FreeMarker). For example, the feature described here > > https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3/wiki/Macros-as-Functions was > > added to support CongoCC development back in 2020, but probably a lot of > > FreeMarker users would appreciate this. > > > > So, at some point, I did rework FreeMarker to use CongoCC instead of the > > legacy JavaCC. CongoCC is a much, much more powerful parser generator > than > > the original JavaCC, so it makes FreeMarker development comparatively a > > breeze. For example, I quite recently implemented assertions in > FreeMarker > > and this is where it is implemented: > > > https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3/blob/master/src/parser/Directives.inc.ccc#L417-L445 > > > > Or here is where ternary expressions are implemented: > > > https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3/blob/master/src/parser/Expressions.inc.ccc#L98-L118 > > You really should compare the FreeMarker grammar expressed with CongoCC > to > > the one that was written with legacy JavaCC, that is here: > > https://github.com/apache/freemarker/blob/2.3-gae/src/main/javacc/FTL.jj > > > > So I rewrote FreeMarker (it is largely a rewrite at this point) to: (a) > > have a better tool for CongoCC development and (b) to provide a showcase > > for CongoCC's capabilities. > > > > As for my plans, well, I do think it would be a pity if a wider group of > > people never get the benefit of this work. Whether I intend to call this > > version of FreeMarker "FreeMarker 3" or rename it to "Congo Templates", I > > still haven't decided about that. I really only put some serious effort > > into the FreeMarker codebase starting this summer and the work kind of > took > > on a life of its own. > > > > In any case, anybody who is interested in getting involved, by all means. > > Maybe start a discussion here: > > https://github.com/freemarker/freemarker3/discussions > > > > Best Regards and Greetings from Spain, > > > > Jonathan Revusky > -- Best regards, Daniel Dekany
