Laravel 4.2 blade: check if empty

Question

In Laravel blade you can do:

{{ $variable or 'default' }} 

This will check if a variable is set or not. I get some data from the database, and those variables are always set, so I can not use this method.

I am searching for a shorthand 'blade' function for doing this:

{{ ($variable != '' ? $variable : '') }} 

It is hard to use this piece or code for doing this beacuse of, I do not know how to do it with a link or something like this:

<a href="{{ $school->website }}" target="_blank">{{ $school->website }}</a> 

I tried:

{{ ($school->website != '' ? '<a href="{{ $school->website }}" target="_blank">{{ $school->website }}</a>' : '') }} 

But, it does not work. And, I would like to keep my code as short as possible ;)

Can someone explain it to me?

UPDATE

I do not use a foreach because of, I get a single object (one school) from the database. I passed it from my controller to my view with:

 $school = School::find($id);  return View::make('school.show')->with('school', $school); 

So, I do not want to make an @if($value != ''){} around each $variable (like $school->name).

Answer 1

try this:

@if ($value !== '')     {{ HTML::link($value,'some text') }} @endif 

Answer 2

I prefer the @unless directive for readability in this circumstance.

@unless ( empty($school->website) )     <a href="{{ $school->website }}" target="_blank">{{ $school->website }}</a> @endunless