Trac Macros

Trac macros extend the Trac engine with custom functionality. Macros are a special type of plugin and are written in Python. A macro inserts dynamic HTML data in any context supporting WikiFormatting.

The macro syntax is [[macro-name(optional-arguments)]].

WikiProcessors are another kind of macros. They are typically used for source code highlighting, such as !#python or !#apache and when the source code spans multiple lines, such as:

{{{#!wiki-processor-name
... 
}}}

Using Macros

Macro calls are enclosed in double-square brackets [[..]]. Like Python functions, macros can have arguments, which is then a comma separated list within parentheses [[..(,)]].

Getting Detailed Help

The list of available macros and the full help can be obtained using the MacroList macro, as seen below.

A brief list can be obtained via [[MacroList(*)]] or [[?]].

Detailed help on a specific macro can be obtained by passing it as an argument to MacroList, e.g. [[MacroList(MacroList)]], or, more conveniently, by appending a question mark (?) to the macro's name, like in [[MacroList?]].

Example

A list of the 3 most recently changed wiki pages starting with 'Trac':

Wiki Markup	Display
[[RecentChanges(Trac,3)]]	2020-07-10 TracPermissions (diff) TracModWSGI (diff) TracQuery (diff)
[[RecentChanges?(Trac,3)]]	[[RecentChanges]] List all pages that have recently been modified, ordered by the time they were last modified. This macro accepts two ordered arguments and a named argument. The named argument can be placed in any position within the argument list. The first parameter is a prefix string: if provided, only pages with names that start with the prefix are included in the resulting list. If this parameter is omitted, all pages are included in the list. The second parameter is the maximum number of pages to include in the list. The group parameter determines how the list is presented: group=date The pages are presented in bulleted lists that are grouped by date (default). group=none The pages are presented in a single bulleted list. Tip: if you only want to specify a maximum number of entries and don't want to filter by prefix, specify an empty first parameter, e.g. [[RecentChanges(,10,group=none)]].
[[?]]	[[Image]] Embed an image in wiki-formatted text. The first argument is the file, as in [[Image(filename.png)]] [[InterTrac]] Provide a list of known InterTrac prefixes. [[InterWiki]] Provide a description list for the known InterWiki prefixes. [[KnownMimeTypes]] List all known mime-types which can be used as WikiProcessors. etc.

Available Macros

Note that the following list will only contain the macro documentation if you've not enabled -OO optimizations, or not set the PythonOptimize option for mod_python.

[[BlogList]]

A macro to display list of posts and extracts outside (or inside) the Blog module - most commonly Wiki pages.

All arguments are optional:

[[BlogList]]

Available named arguments:

• recent= - max. number of posts
• category= - a category
• author= - an author
• period= - time period of the format YYYY/MM
• heading= - a heading for the list
• format= - type of display (see below for details)
• max_size= - max. number of characters to render for each post
• meta= - use =off to hide date, author and categories (default 'on')

Example showing some available named arguments:

[[BlogList(recent=5, max_size=250, period=2007/12, author=osimons, format=float, heading=Some Trac Posts)]]

The arguments for criteria are 'AND'-based, so the above example will render at most 5 posts by 'osimons' in December 2007.

There is no heading unless specified.

Without restriction on recent number of posts, it will use the number currently active in the Blog module as default for 'float' and 'full' rendering, but for rendering of 'inline' list it will render all found as default unless restricted. Additionally for 'float' and 'full' it will truncate content if it is larger than a max_size (if set).

The format= keyword argument supports rendering these formats:

format=inline	Renders an unordered list in the normal text flow (default).
format=float	A floating box out on the side of the page with slightly more detail.
format=full	Full rendering like on period, category and author listings inside blog.

The arguments can appear in any order.

Posts are rendered sorted by newest first for all modes.

[[Image]]

Embed an image in wiki-formatted text.

The first argument is the file specification. The file specification may reference attachments in three ways:

• module:id:file, where module can be either wiki or ticket, to refer to the attachment named file of the specified wiki page or ticket.
• id:file: same as above, but id is either a ticket shorthand or a Wiki page name.
• file to refer to a local attachment named 'file'. This only works from within that wiki page or a ticket.

The file specification may also refer to:

• repository files, using the source:file syntax (source:file@rev works also).
• files, using direct URLs: /file for a project-relative, //file for a server-relative, or http://server/file for absolute location. An InterWiki prefix may be used.
• embedded data using the ​rfc2397 data URL scheme, provided the URL is enclosed in quotes.

The remaining arguments are optional and allow configuring the attributes and style of the rendered <img> element:

• digits and unit are interpreted as the size (ex. 120px, 25%) for the image
• right, left, center, top, bottom and middle are interpreted as the alignment for the image (alternatively, the first three can be specified using align=... and the last three using valign=...)
• link=some TracLinks... replaces the link to the image source by the one specified using a TracLinks. If no value is specified, the link is simply removed.
• inline specifies that the content generated be an inline XHTML element. By default, inline content is not generated, therefore images won't be rendered in section headings and other one-line content.
• nolink means without link to image source (deprecated, use link=)
• key=value style are interpreted as HTML attributes or CSS style indications for the image. Valid keys are:
  • align, valign, border, width, height, alt, title, longdesc, class, margin, margin-(left,right,top,bottom), id and usemap
  • border, margin, and margin-* can only be a single number (units are pixels).
  • margin is superseded by center which uses auto margins

Examples:

[[Image(photo.jpg)]]               # simplest
[[Image(photo.jpg, 120px)]]        # with image width size
[[Image(photo.jpg, right)]]        # aligned by keyword
[[Image(photo.jpg, nolink)]]       # without link to source
[[Image(photo.jpg, align=right)]]  # aligned by attribute

You can use an image from a wiki page, ticket or other module.

[[Image(OtherPage:foo.bmp)]]    # from a wiki page
[[Image(base/sub:bar.bmp)]]     # from hierarchical wiki page
[[Image(#3:baz.bmp)]]           # from another ticket
[[Image(ticket:36:boo.jpg)]]    # from another ticket (long form)
[[Image(source:/img/bee.jpg)]]  # from the repository
[[Image(htdocs:foo/bar.png)]]   # from project htdocs dir
[[Image(shared:foo/bar.png)]]   # from shared htdocs dir (since 1.0.2)

Adapted from the Image.py macro created by Shun-ichi Goto <gotoh@…>

[[InterTrac]]

Provide a list of known InterTrac prefixes.

[[InterWiki]]

Provide a description list for the known InterWiki prefixes.

[[KnownMimeTypes]]

List all known mime-types which can be used as WikiProcessors.

Can be given an optional argument which is interpreted as mime-type filter.

[[ListTagged]]

List tagged resources. Usage: [[ListTagged(<query>[,exclude=<list>],[[format=<format>],cols=<columns>])]] format:: result list presentation; supported values:

compact

comma-separated inline list of "linked-description"

oldlist (default)

" * linked-id description (tags)" list

table

table... (see corresponding column option too)

short or other value

bulleted list of "linked-description"

cols:: columns for 'table' format using a "|"-separated list of column names (order matters); supported columns: realm, id, description, tags exclude:: exclude tagged resources that match a name in the colon-separated list of resource ids, accepts shell-style patterns See tags documentation for the query syntax.

[[MacroList]]

Display a list of all installed Wiki macros, including documentation if available.

Optionally, the name of a specific macro can be provided as an argument. In that case, only the documentation for that macro will be rendered.

Note that this macro will not be able to display the documentation of macros if the PythonOptimize option is enabled for mod_python!

[[PageOutline]]

Display a structural outline of the current wiki page, each item in the outline being a link to the corresponding heading.

This macro accepts four optional parameters:

• The first is a number or range that allows configuring the minimum and maximum level of headings that should be included in the outline. For example, specifying "1" here will result in only the top-level headings being included in the outline. Specifying "2-3" will make the outline include all headings of level 2 and 3, as a nested list. The default is to include all heading levels.
• The second parameter can be used to specify a custom title (the default is no title).
• The third parameter selects the style of the outline. This can be either inline or pullout (the latter being the default). The inline style renders the outline as normal part of the content, while pullout causes the outline to be rendered in a box that is by default floated to the right side of the other content.
• The fourth parameter specifies whether the outline is numbered or not. It can be either numbered or unnumbered (the former being the default). This parameter only has an effect in inline style.

[[RecentChanges]]

List all pages that have recently been modified, ordered by the time they were last modified.

This macro accepts two ordered arguments and a named argument. The named argument can be placed in any position within the argument list.

The first parameter is a prefix string: if provided, only pages with names that start with the prefix are included in the resulting list. If this parameter is omitted, all pages are included in the list.

The second parameter is the maximum number of pages to include in the list.

The group parameter determines how the list is presented:

group=date

The pages are presented in bulleted lists that are grouped by date (default).

group=none

The pages are presented in a single bulleted list.

Tip: if you only want to specify a maximum number of entries and don't want to filter by prefix, specify an empty first parameter, e.g. [[RecentChanges(,10,group=none)]].

[[SubscriberList]]

Display a list of all installed notification subscribers, including documentation if available.

Optionally, the name of a specific subscriber can be provided as an argument. In that case, only the documentation for that subscriber will be rendered.

Note that this macro will not be able to display the documentation of subscribers if the PythonOptimize option is enabled for mod_python!

[[TagCloud]]

Display a tag cloud. Show a tag cloud for all tags on resources matching query. Usage: [[TagCloud(<query>[,caseless_sort=<bool>][,mincount=<n>])]] caseless_sort:: Whether the tag cloud should be sorted case-sensitive. mincount:: Optional integer threshold to hide tags with smaller count. See tags documentation for the query syntax.

[[TitleIndex]]

Insert an alphabetic list of all wiki pages into the output.

Accepts a prefix string as parameter: if provided, only pages with names that start with the prefix are included in the resulting list. If this parameter is omitted, all pages are listed. If the prefix is specified, a second argument of value hideprefix can be given as well, in order to remove that prefix from the output.

The prefix string supports the standard relative-path notation when using the macro in a wiki page. A prefix string starting with ./ will be relative to the current page, and parent pages can be specified using ../.

Several named parameters can be specified:

• format=compact: The pages are displayed as comma-separated links.
• format=group: The list of pages will be structured in groups according to common prefix. This format also supports a min=n argument, where n is the minimal number of pages for a group.
• format=hierarchy: The list of pages will be structured according to the page name path hierarchy. This format also supports a min=n argument, where higher n flatten the display hierarchy
• depth=n: limit the depth of the pages to list. If set to 0, only toplevel pages will be shown, if set to 1, only immediate children pages will be shown, etc. If not set, or set to -1, all pages in the hierarchy will be shown.
• include=page1:page*2: include only pages that match an item in the colon-separated list of pages. If the list is empty, or if no include argument is given, include all pages.
• exclude=page1:page*2: exclude pages that match an item in the colon- separated list of pages.

The include and exclude lists accept shell-style patterns.

[[TracAdminHelp]]

Display help for trac-admin commands.

Examples:

[[TracAdminHelp]]               # all commands
[[TracAdminHelp(wiki)]]         # all wiki commands
[[TracAdminHelp(wiki export)]]  # the "wiki export" command
[[TracAdminHelp(upgrade)]]      # the upgrade command

[[TracGuideToc]]

Display a table of content for the Trac guide.

This macro shows a quick and dirty way to make a table-of-contents for the Help/Guide. The table of contents will contain the Trac* and WikiFormatting pages, and can't be customized. See the ​TocMacro for a more customizable table of contents.

[[TracIni]]

Produce documentation for the Trac configuration file.

Typically, this will be used in the TracIni page. The macro accepts two ordered arguments and two named arguments.

The ordered arguments are a configuration section filter, and a configuration option name filter: only the configuration options whose section and name start with the filters are output.

The named arguments can be specified:

section

a glob-style filtering on the section names

option

a glob-style filtering on the option names

Macros from around the world

The ​Trac Hacks site provides a wide collection of macros and other Trac plugins contributed by the Trac community. If you are looking for new macros, or have written one that you would like to share, please visit that site.

Developing Custom Macros

Macros, like Trac itself, are written in the ​Python programming language and are developed as part of TracPlugins.

For more information about developing macros, see the ​development resources on the main project site.

Here are 2 simple examples showing how to create a Macro. Also, have a look at ​Timestamp.py for an example that shows the difference between old style and new style macros and at the ​macros/README which provides more insight about the transition.

Macro without arguments

To test the following code, save it in a timestamp_sample.py file located in the TracEnvironment's plugins/ directory.

from datetime import datetime
# Note: since Trac 0.11, datetime objects are used internally

from genshi.builder import tag

from trac.util.datefmt import format_datetime, utc
from trac.wiki.macros import WikiMacroBase

class TimeStampMacro(WikiMacroBase):
    """Inserts the current time (in seconds) into the wiki page."""

    revision = "$Rev$"
    url = "$URL$"

    def expand_macro(self, formatter, name, text):
        t = datetime.now(utc)
        return tag.strong(format_datetime(t, '%c'))

Macro with arguments

To test the following code, save it in a helloworld_sample.py file located in the TracEnvironment's plugins/ directory.

from genshi.core import Markup

from trac.wiki.macros import WikiMacroBase

class HelloWorldMacro(WikiMacroBase):
    """Simple HelloWorld macro.

    Note that the name of the class is meaningful:
     - it must end with "Macro"
     - what comes before "Macro" ends up being the macro name

    The documentation of the class (i.e. what you're reading)
    will become the documentation of the macro, as shown by
    the !MacroList macro (usually used in the WikiMacros page).
    """

    revision = "$Rev$"
    url = "$URL$"

    def expand_macro(self, formatter, name, text, args):
        """Return some output that will be displayed in the Wiki content.

        `name` is the actual name of the macro (no surprise, here it'll be
        `'HelloWorld'`),
        `text` is the text enclosed in parenthesis at the call of the macro.
          Note that if there are ''no'' parenthesis (like in, e.g.
          [[HelloWorld]]), then `text` is `None`.
        `args` are the arguments passed when HelloWorld is called using a
        `#!HelloWorld` code block.
        """
        return 'Hello World, text = %s, args = %s' % \
            (Markup.escape(text), Markup.escape(repr(args)))

Note that expand_macro optionally takes a 4^th parameter args. When the macro is called as a WikiProcessor, it is also possible to pass key=value processor parameters. If given, those are stored in a dictionary and passed in this extra args parameter. In the other case, when called as a macro, args is None. (since 0.12).

For example, when writing:

{{{#!HelloWorld style="polite" -silent verbose
<Hello World!>
}}}

{{{#!HelloWorld
<Hello World!>
}}}

[[HelloWorld(<Hello World!>)]]

One should get:

Hello World, text = <Hello World!>, args = {'style': u'polite', 'silent': False, 'verbose': True}
Hello World, text = <Hello World!>, args = {}
Hello World, text = <Hello World!>, args = None

Note that the return value of expand_macro is not HTML escaped. Depending on the expected result, you should escape it yourself (using return Markup.escape(result)) or, if this is indeed HTML, wrap it in a Markup object (return Markup(result)) with Markup coming from Genshi (from genshi.core import Markup).

You can also recursively use a wiki Formatter (from trac.wiki import Formatter) to process the text as wiki markup:

from genshi.core import Markup
from trac.wiki.macros import WikiMacroBase
from trac.wiki import Formatter
import StringIO

class HelloWorldMacro(WikiMacroBase):
    def expand_macro(self, formatter, name, text, args):
        text = "whatever '''wiki''' markup you want, even containing other macros"
        # Convert Wiki markup to HTML, new style
        out = StringIO.StringIO()
        Formatter(self.env, formatter.context).format(text, out)
        return Markup(out.getvalue())