How to output ${expression} in Freemarker without

Question

I'm trying to use Freemarker in conjunction with jQuery Templates.

Both frameworks use dollar sign/curly brackets to identify expressions for substitution (or as they're called in freemarker, "interpolations") , e.g. ${person.name} .

So when I define a jQuery Template with expressions in that syntax, Freemarker tries to interpret them (and fails).

I've tried various combinations of escaping the ${ sequence to pass it through Freemarker to no avail - \${, \$\{, $\{, etc.

Inserting a freemarker comment in between the dollar and the curly (e.g. $<#-- -->{expression}) DOES work - but I'm looking for a more concise and elegant solution.

Is there a simpler way to get a Freemarker template to output the character sequence ${?

Answer 1

If ${ is your only problem, then you could use the alternate syntax in the jQuery Templates plugin like this: {{= person.name}}

Maybe a little cleaner than escaping it.

Answer 2

Also, if you have longer sections without FreeMarker markup, you can use <#noparse>...</#noparse>.

If you have this issue a lot, since FreeMarker 2.3.28 you can configure FreeMarker to use [=exp] instead of ${exp}, by setting the interpolation_syntax configuration setting to square_bracket (in the Java API: Configuration cfg; ... cfg.setInterpolationSyntax(Configuration.SQUARE_BRACKET_INTERPOLATION_SYNTAX)). Then ${exp} is just static text for FreeMarker. Do not confuse this setting with the tag_syntax setting, which also can have square_bracket value, but is independent of the interpolation syntax (but you may prefer setting both to square_bracket). See also: https://freemarker.apache.org/docs/dgui_misc_alternativesyntax.html

Answer 3

Another option is to use #include with parse=false option. That is, put your jQuery Templates into the separate include page and use parse=false so that freemarker doesn't try and parse it.

This would be a good option when the templates are larger and contain double quotes.

Answer 4

I had to spent some time to figure out the following scenarios to escape ${expression} -

• In Freemarker assignment:

<#assign var = r"${expression}">

• In html attribute:

<a href="/user/${r"${expression}"}"> Some link </a>

• In Freemarker concatenation:

<#assign x = "something&"+r"${expression}"/>

Answer 5

This should print ${person.name}:

${r"${person.name}"}

Answer 6

Did you try $$?

I found from the Freemarker manual that ${r"${person.name}"} will print out ${person.name} without attempting to render it.

Perhaps you should also take a look at Freemarker escaping freemarker