How to locate resources in Orchard

Question

I am writing an Orchard theme, and I'd like to be able to locate some of the resources packaged with the theme (images/swfs etc).

What is the best way of doing this?

I've had a look at ResourceManifest files, using builder.Add.DefineResource but I can't seem to find it's counterpart in the view. Or do I just put the full path in?

Any hints?

Cheers Carl

Answer 1

If you need to define the new resource (script or stylesheet):

1. Create a class inheriting IResourceManifestProvider
2. Provide the void BuildManifests(ResourceManifestBuilder builder) method and
3. Add all necessary resources via builder.Add().DefineStyle("") or builder.Add().DefineScript(...), just as you noted in your question.

For example:

public class ResourceManifest : IResourceManifestProvider {
    public void BuildManifests(ResourceManifestBuilder builder) {
        var manifest = builder.Add();
        manifest.DefineStyle("MyStyle").SetUrl("mystyle.css");
        manifest.DefineScript("MyScript").SetUrl("myscript.js").SetDependencies("jQuery");
    }
}

This defines one style and script you can reuse in your views. Urls are relative to /Styles (or /Scripts) folders in your theme/module where the class is located.

If you want to reuse some of resources already defined (in all enabled modules and themes), it's as easy as writing eg.:

...
@{
    Style.Require("MyStyle").AtHead();
    Script.Require("MyScript").AtFoot();
}
...

inside your .cshtml view file. Example above would inject mystyle.css and myscript.js at appropriate locations (header/footer of the final page).

Answer 2

I slapped together an extension method for a similar problem:

public static string ResourceUrl(this HtmlHelper helper, string resourceType, string resourceName)
{
    var manager = helper.Resolve<IResourceManager>();
    var settings = new RequireSettings { Type = resourceType, Name = resourceName, BasePath = resourceType };
    var resource = manager.FindResource(settings);
    var context = new ResourceRequiredContext { Resource = resource, Settings = settings };

    var url = context.GetResourceUrl(settings, "/");

    return url;
}

Resource Manifest Definition:

manifest.DefineResource("Content", "MyImage").SetUrl("Content/myimage.png");

View Usage:

@Html.ResourceUrl("Content", "MyImage")

It's not well tested, and could probably use some error handling, but its working for me.

Answer 3

Just to be clear, there are a few methods depending on your situation. I'll outline the most common I know.

First of all, there is the inclusion of an external script or stylesheet on your particular part or theme. The standard syntax within a Razor template is this:

@Style.Include("YourPartEdit")
@Script.Require("jQuery")
@Script.Include("YourPartEdit")

The include files will look for that particular resource in the corresponding Style or Scripts folder: for @Script.Include("YourPartEdit"), it will look in the scripts folder for YourPartEdit.js.

You might have noticed that with Script.Require you can register a library with Orchard (in this case the registered one is jQuery), and cause a module to require that particular script.

To do this you create your own implementation of the IResourceManifestProvider interface, and implement the BuildManifests(ResourceManifestBuilder builder) method and create a named resource. You can use .AtFoot() or .AtHead() to even target where it will go.

Now say you want to reference a particular image, and you want to use Razor to always point to the correct image Url. First of all I recommend placing the image in your Content folder for your theme (assuming this is a theme related image), and you'll do something along these lines:

<img [email protected](Html.ThemePath(WorkContext.CurrentTheme, "/Content/your-logo.png")) />

Now, say this is on your Layout.cshtml page - you'll now successfully serve the image anywhere on the site.

These particular techniques should account for a multitude of situations.

Answer 4

In stylesheets, relative paths (from the stylesheet path) should be used.

In views, you should use Url.Content.