Built-in Functions

Smarty Manual
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# Chapter 7. Built-in Functions

Smarty comes with several built-in functions. These built-in functions are the integral part of the smarty template engine. You cannot create your own custom functions with the same name; and you should not need to modify the built-in functions.

A few on these functions have an `assign` attribute which collects the result the function to a named variable within a template instead of being output; much like the `{assign}` function.

# {capture}

`{capture}` is used to collect the output of the template between the tags into a variable instead of displaying it. Any content between `{capture name='foo'}` and `{/capture}` is collected into the variable specified in the `name` attribute.

The captured content can be used in the template from the variable `$smarty.capture.foo` where "foo" is the value passed in the `name` attribute. If you do not supply the `name` attribute, then "default" will be used as the name ie `$smarty.capture.default`.

`{capture}'s` can be nested.

Attribute Name | Type | Required | Default | Description
--- | --- | --- | --- | ---
name | string | no | default | The name of the captured block
assign | string | No | n/a | The variable name where to assign the captured output to

Caution
Be careful when capturing `{insert}` output. If you have `$caching` enabled and you have `{insert}` commands that you expect to run within cached content, do not capture this content.

Example 7-1. {capture} with a the name attribute
    {* we don't want to print a div tag unless content is displayed *}
    {capture name=banner}
      {include file='get_banner.tpl'}
    {/capture}

    {if $smarty.capture.banner ne ''}
    <div id="banner">{$smarty.capture.banner}</div>
    {/if}

Example 7-2. {capture} into a template variable This example also demonstrates the `{popup}` function
    {capture name=some_content assign=popText}
    The server is {$smarty.server.SERVER_NAME|upper} at {$smarty.server.SERVER_ADDR}<br>
    Your ip is {$smarty.server.REMOTE_ADDR}.
    {/capture}
    <a href="#" {popup caption='Server Info' text=$popText}>help</a>

See also `$smarty.capture`, `{eval}`, `{fetch}`, `fetch()` and `{assign}`.

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