Development

Pages are developed, maintained and deployed by Ubidots users in order to create completely custom visualization that meet requirements otherwise not addressed natively by the platform.

A Page is structured around a specific set of files. These files not only determine the Page settings, for example, references to local or external CDN-exposed CSS and JavaScript (JS) libraries, but also define its logic and overall functionality. The file structure for a Page is outlined below:

├── manifest.toml
├── script.js
├── body.html
├── style.css
├── static
│   ├── some_files_or_folders

Adhering to this file structure and including all the mentioned files is mandatory for the Page to function correctly and be able to be deployed.

Allowed file extensions in the static folder

.csv, .css, .gif, .html, .ini, .jpeg, .jpg, .js, .json, .jsx, .log, .md, .mjs, .png, .rst, .svg, .ts, .tsv, .tsx, .toml, .txt, .webp, .xml, .yaml, .yml

manifest.toml

The manifest file defines the Page's settings and references to local or external CSS and JS resources, that is, it outlines:

Name of the page.
Keywords.
Description.
Path to local files.
Local and third party JS libraries.
Local and third party CCS stylesheets.

The typical manifest file of a Page is composed by the below keys and values.

Key

Type

Description

name

String

Name of the page

keywords

Comma-separated strings

This is added in a <meta> tag to the HTML document's <head>.

description

String

This is added to the HTML document's <head> tag within a <meta> tag.

static_paths

List of strings

Paths to folders containing local files.

js_libraries

List of sets

It references local JS files. These files are included with a <script> tag in the HTML document's <head>.

js_thirdparty_libraries

List of sets

It references CDN-based JS libraries. These files are included with a <script> tag in the HTML document's <head>.

css_libraries

List of sets

It references local CSS stylesheets. These files are included with a <link rel="stylesheet"> tag in the HTML document's <head>.

css_thirdparty_libraries

List of sets

It references CDN-based CSS stylesheets. These files are included with a <link rel="stylesheet"> tag in the HTML document's <head>.

link_libraries

List of sets

It references local resources. These files are included with a tag in the HTML document's <head>.

link_thirdparty_libraries

List of sets

It references external resources. These files are included with a tag in the HTML document's <head>.

With that in mind, a manifest file looks like this:

The manifest.toml file most start with the [page] section header.

[page]
name = "Page name"
keywords = "test,validation"
description = "Page for testing purposes."
static_paths = ["static"]

js_libraries = [{src="script.js", type="module", defer="", crossorigin=""}]
js_thirdparty_libraries = [
    {src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/echarts/5.4.3/echarts.min.js"},
    {src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/moment.js/2.29.1/moment.min.js"}
]

css_libraries = [{href="style.css", crossorigin=""}]
css_thirdparty_libraries = []

link_libraries = [{href="static/style_link.css", type="font", crossorigin=""}]
link_thirdparty_libraries = []

The below shows how Ubidots interprets the Page's name, keywords and description, and adds it to the Page's HTML document's <head> automatically.

<head>
     <title>Page name</title>
     <meta name="keywords" content="test,validation"/>
     <meta name="description" content="Page for testing purposes."/>
</head>

Read the following section to learn about how Ubidots interprets the libraries keys.

Libraries syntax

This applies to the "List of sets" type keys. These keys hold list values, where each element has either of the below forms:

Key

Form

Description

– js_libraries

– js_thirdparty_libraries

{src=<URL|path>, [ATTRIBUTES]}

[ATTRIBUTES] can be any of HTML's tag.

– css_libraries

– css_thirdparty_libraries

– link_libraries

– link_thirdparty_libraries

{href=<URL|path>, [ATTRIBUTES]}

[ATTRIBUTES] can be any of HTML's tag.

The way Ubidots interprets these libraries keys and adds it to the Page's HTML document's <head> is as follows:

<head>
    <!-- js_libraries
    TOML: {src="script.js", type="module", defer="", crossorigin=""}
    Translates to:
    -->
    <script src="UBIDOTS_CDN_URL/script.js" type="module" defer crossorigin></script>
    
    <!-- js_thirdparty_libraries
    TOML: {src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/echarts/5.4.3/echarts.min.js"}
    Translates to:
    -->
    <script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/echarts/5.4.3/echarts.min.js"></script>
    
    <!-- css_libraries
    TOML: {href="style.css", crossorigin=""}
    Translates to:
    -->
    <link href="UBIDOTS_CDN_URL/style.css" crossorigin rel="stylesheet"/>
    
    <!-- css_thirdparty_libraries
    TOML: {href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Roboto:300i,400&display=swap", crossorigin=""}
    Translates to:
    -->
    <link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Roboto:300i,400&display=swap" crossorigin rel="stylesheet"/>
    
    <!-- link_libraries
    TOML: {href="static/style_link.css", type="font", crossorigin=""}
    Translates to:
    -->
    <link href="UBIDOTS_CDN_URL/static/style_link.css" type="font" crossorigin rel="stylesheet"/>
    
    <!-- link_thirdparty_libraries
    TOML: {href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Roboto:310i,410&display=swap", type="font", crossorigin=""}
    Translates to:
    -->
    <link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Roboto:310i,410&display=swap" type="font" crossorigin rel="stylesheet"/>
</head>

script.js

This file holds the JS logic of the Page. It can:

Use the js_libraries and js_thirdparty_libraries specified in the manifest.toml file.
It has access to .

body.html

This is the HTML body of the page. You should only include the contents of the <body>. Ubidots will then put all of it within the actual Page's body. For example:

Your code:

<div id="main"></div>

Loaded in the page:

<body>
    <div id="main"></div>
</body>

Your body.html file should not include the <head> as Ubidots creates it using the manifest.toml file.

style.css

This the main stylesheet of your page, although you can import more either from local files located in the "static_path" folder, or from external resources.

static folder

In this folder, you can upload additional CSS or JS files, more folders or even other types file. This serves as a place to include proprietary libraries or resources such as fonts, icon, images, etc., that are needed for the page rendering. These files can be used in 2 ways within the Page:

By being referenced in the manifest.toml file, in which case Ubidots will import them appropriately as described in the section.
By accessing the files using the public staticURL of the page. See more below.

Accessing files in the /static folder (or other folder referenced in the manifest.toml) from the script.js is done as follows:

const staticPageUrl = window.staticUrl;
const imageUrl = `${staticPageUrl}/<path>/<fileName>.<extension>`;

Where <path> is the path referenced in the manifest.toml, for example "static", and then <fileName> and <extension> are the specific file and extension within the "static" folder.

Allowed file extensions

.csv, .css, .gif, .html, .ini, .jpeg, .jpg, .js, .json, .jsx, .log, .md, .mjs, .png, .rst, .svg, .ts, .tsv, .tsx, .toml, .txt, .webp, .xml, .yaml, .yml

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