Assign layout to multiple documents by targetting paths/collections

With a lot of similar content (e.g. blog posts), it would be nice to assign a layout to them at one swoop.

Let’s say I have a bunch of documents in src/posts. Then, I would like to somehow target these documents via their common path (could be relative to dir.input, e.g. posts).

An obvious approach would be introducing a new configuration option.

Additionally, would a zero-configuration scenario somehow work? For the documents in src/posts, Eleventy could guess that the default layout for posts is required. If there is one (maybe in _includes/layouts/posts.html), use it; otherwise, continue as usual.

[kleinfreund]

With this, how does one apply a layout globally? For example, I have a test.html inside dir.input with no front matter. How can I apply _includes/layouts/default.njk to all templates by default?

Preferably, I wouldn’t need adding any front matter to my content files. Ideally, I would have a directory with dumb content files (e.g. markdown, html) that are processed as templates without having any additional meta data themselves. That would be wonderful.

[jevets]

I like @zachleat’s eleventyConfig.addData() idea above. This could solve the default layout problem I’ve been facing as well (end up creating many .json files in root that do nothing more than define a layout).

I like @kleinfreund’s idea above, too. It reminds me of how harp.js handles JSON data. A global root-level harp.json file worked well for defaults and other globals, while local _data.json files worked great for overriding and additional data. Specific files can be targeted by keying its basename in the JSON.

The main problem seems to be more specific to root-level templates; the directory/template specific data works well (i.e. posts/posts.json), but it currently doesn’t apply to root-level templates.

A simple _data.json (or _data/_data.json) would be nice, which would basically do the same as the eleventyConfig.addData() idea above. Be nice if I could do either.