A way to render a separate field

In many cases it is easier to render the form manually in the template file. Consider a simple form:

var form = forms.create({
    q: forms.fields.string()
});
form.handle(req, {
    other: function (boundForm) {
        ...

I want to render that field in my template in a custom hand-crafted layout. Supposedly, form.fields.q.toHTML() and boundForm.fields.q.toHTML() should render the input field only (with the pre-filled submitted value in latter case), but instead they render the entire line with unwanted extra tags:

<div class="field"><label for="id_q">Q</label><input type="text" name="q" id="id_q" /></div>

You can take a look on the degree of freedom in Django forms engine: https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/topics/forms/#customizing-the-form-template

[IlyaSemenov]

Technically that’s correct, and I was a little exaggerating.

But if there were a method that simply emits a naked input (a shortcut for boundField.toHTML(null, function(name, field, options) { return field.widget.toHTML(name, field) })), that would be suited for any of those top 10 sites out of the box, without any need for creating “widgets”, and readily available for the division of labor between the backend node.js developer and the no-so-qualified guy that does the HTML cut and puts <input>'s where they belong.

95% of the form fields in the actual web sites do not conform to what boundField.toHTML() emits, and never will. 99% of the forms do not conform to what form.toHTML() emits, and never will. Basically we have a default which is only useful for prototyping and academic use, and we are forced to jump through hoops for any real work (involving commercial-grade design and HTML cut), while there is an obvious simple method which would allow to avoid any of that work and keep the code clean, simple, readable and supportable.

[IlyaSemenov]

@ljharb, let me put it this way: if rendering a naked input field widget is to be treated as a rare edge case (as you seem to believe), indeed there is already a (rather twisted) way to achieve it.

My point is that rendering a naked input widget should be the default behaviour of boundField.toHTML() (instead of forms.render.div), or at least have a sane-looking built-in shortcut. What you suggest — repetitive use of boundField.toHTML(null, function(name, field, options) { return field.widget.toHTML(name, field) }) for every field — is beyond of being acceptable for such a frequent use case as creating a form with custom layout.

Of course, this only relates to individual fields, not the form as a whole. How form.toHTML() currently works is just fine so not sure why you were giving it as example. form.toHTML() is basically a prototyping/repetitive use shortcut anyway, in real life projects there’s little chance that the actual forms don’t get customized in this way or another.

If you as a library maintainer do not see any sense in this, then yes, please simply consider my case solved.