Can I Extend My Template Based on a Condition -Django

Question

I have a template that needs to use separate base templates depending on whether a user is a system admin or a regular administrator. The main difference between the two templates is that one contains more nav bar items and links to other portions of the app. I'd like the system to recognize whether a user is a system admin or regular admin and extend the correct base template off of that test.

I know this can be accomplished by creating a second template and doing something like this in the views.py file:

if sysAdmin == True:
        template = loader.get_template('app/template1.html')
else:
        template = loader.get_template('app/template2.html')

There are multiple shared views between the two user groups and I would rather not have 4 sets of templates that are almost completely identical. I'd prefer to do something like:

{% if sysAdmin == True %}
    {% extends "app/sysAdminBase.html" %}
{% elif sysAdmin == False %}
    {% extends "app/adminbase.html" %}
{% end if %}

However, this throws the error Invalid block tag on line 3: 'elif'. Did you forget to register or load this tag? Is this possible or will I need to create duplicate templates? Thank you

Answer 1

The extends tag can be passed a variable that resolves to a string, pass the template that you want to extend in your context

if sysAdmin == True:
    context['parent_template'] = 'app/sysAdminBase.html'
else:
    context['parent_template'] = 'app/adminbase.html'

Template:

{% extends parent_template %}