(Pre-)Compilation

Handlebars.compile(template, options)

Compiles a template so it can be executed immediately.

const template = Handlebars.compile("{{foo}}");
template({});

Supports a variety of options that alter how the template executes.

• data: Set to false to disable @data tracking.
• compat: Set to true to enable recursive field lookup.
• knownHelpers: Hash containing list of helpers that are known to exist (truthy) at template execution time. Passing this allows the compiler to optimize a number of cases. Builtin helpers are automatically included in this list and may be omitted by setting that value to false.
• knownHelpersOnly: Set to true to allow further optimizations based on the known helpers list.
• noEscape: Set to true to not HTML escape any content.
• strict: Run in strict mode. In this mode, templates will throw rather than silently ignore missing fields. This has the side effect of disabling inverse operations such as {{^foo}}{{/foo}} unless fields are explicitly included in the source object.
• assumeObjects: Removes object existence checks when traversing paths. This is a subset of strict mode that generates optimized templates when the data inputs are known to be safe.
• preventIndent: By default, an indented partial-call causes the output of the whole partial being indented by the same amount. This can lead to unexpected behavior when the partial writes pre-tags. Setting this option to true will disable the auto-indent feature.
• ignoreStandalone: Disables standalone tag removal when set to true. When set, blocks and partials that are on their own line will not remove the whitespace on that line.
• explicitPartialContext: Disables implicit context for partials. When enabled, partials that are not passed a context value will execute against an empty object.

Handlebars.precompile(template, options)

Precompiles a given template so it can be sent to the client and executed without compilation.

var templateSpec = Handlebars.precompile("{{foo}}");

Supports all of the same options parameters as the Handlebars.compile method. Additionally may pass:

• srcName: Passed to generate the source map for the input file. When run in this manner, the return structure is {code, map} with code containing the template definition and map containing the source map.
• destName: Optional parameter used in conjunction with srcName to provide a destination file name when generating source maps.

Handlebars.template(templateSpec)

Sets up a template that was precompiled with Handlebars.precompile.

var template = Handlebars.template(templateSpec);
template({});