Default props/classes per element.

[natankeddem]

In my projects I am constantly applying identical props/classes to all elements. It seems like it would be nice to be able to apply a default for some of these attributes that would be reused on every element you create. I know I could probably override the element classes or do something else but I thought there might be something to the idea which might warrant a change. I am not sure if this was asked before, I couldn't find something similar in a search.

[rodja]

We found that inheritance and method wrapping are enough. But it's good to challenge base assumptions. Do you already have a syntax in mind?

[natankeddem]

I would need to think about it. I wanted to see if anyone thought it was worth spending any time on first. I only got as far as getting tired of copying and pasting so far. 🤣

Both of the strategies you listed are definitely legitimate but having something baked in feels better.

[falkoschindler]

I could imagine something like

ui.button.default_props = 'outline rounded'
ui.label.default_classes = 'border'
ui.card.default_style = 'background-color: #eee'

Or maybe it's better to go with class methods (similar to the existing methods props(), classes() and style():

ui.button.default_props('outline rounded')
ui.label.default_classes('border')
ui.card.default_style('background-color: #eee')

If we're lucky we only need to change the implementation of ui.element and all other elements derive the new feature.

[natankeddem]

Both look good but the method is probably best for consistency. I think the single 'element' only change might be possible. It sounds like this idea might have some legs. I can try to submit a draft PR this week so the mechanics could be looked at more closely.

Another idea I had that could be implemented in parallel if you guys thought it was worth looking into would be an 'on_render' callback. This would fire on instantiation of an element and could be registered via decorators I think.

[falkoschindler]

Yes, a PR for the default_props() method would be great! 🙂

I think the on_render deserves its own feature request in order not to mix two different topics. Maybe you can give some more details about how it would be used. The name "on_render" seems to contradict the explanation "fire on instantiation", since an element might be rendered much later (or never), even though it has been instantiated during app startup.

[natankeddem]

Yes, my naming is probably not precise/correct here.

[falkoschindler]

PR #1689 is merged. ✔️