Qalab Basics

Core concepts for working with Qalab templates.

Handles

Handles are URL-friendly identifiers for store resources (products, collections, pages).

{{ product.handle }}        {# health-potion #}
{{ collection.handle }}     {# summer-sale #}

Handle rules:

• Always lowercase
• Spaces become hyphens
• Special characters removed
• Must be unique (duplicates get -1, -2, etc.)

Accessing by Handle

{# Square bracket notation #}
{{ pages['about-us'].url }}

{# Dot notation #}
{{ settings.header_color }}

Operators

Comparison

Operator	Meaning
==	equals
!=	not equals
>	greater than
<	less than
>=	greater or equal
<=	less or equal

Logical

Operator	Meaning
and	both true
or	either true
contains	string/array contains value

{% if product.price > 100 and product.available %}
  Premium product in stock
{% endif %}

{% if product.tags contains 'sale' %}
  On sale!
{% endif %}

Data Types

Type	Example
string	"Hello" or 'Hello'
number	42, 3.14
boolean	true, false
null	undefined value
array	[1, 2, 3]

Truthy and Falsy

Only false and null are falsy. Everything else is truthy:

{# Empty string is truthy - use blank to check #}
{% if settings.title != blank %}
  {{ settings.title }}
{% endif %}

{# Empty object is truthy - use empty to check #}
{% if product != empty %}
  {{ product.title }}
{% endif %}

Whitespace Control

Add hyphens to remove whitespace:

{# With whitespace #}
{% if true %}
  Hello
{% endif %}

{# Without whitespace #}
{%- if true -%}
  Hello
{%- endif -%}