Blending a collection from data and files

[gerwitz]

I think I want to combine the two approaches discussed in #546. I'm hoping someone here can help me figure out how this is possible:

I have a collection of numbered template files, let's say:

list/
    3.md
    4.md

I wish to output a complete list of pages with a larger range, e.g. 1–5. Pages such as 2 that don't have a matching file would have default content (this is easy enough with the layout). In reality, there are thousands so I don't want to pre-create dummy template files.

So my hope is to create a Javascript "data" file that generates dummy templates, then merge the resulting collection with the extant template files. Or merge them from within the Javascript data file itself, though I don't think it has access to the right context scope.

Alternatively, I would like to create template entities on the fly within .addCollection().

Any tips or ideas are welcome!

[gerwitz]

My last-resort workaround is similar to what @MadeByMike did for #587 … so maybe this is a duplicate.

I have also explored the flip side: adding a collection to the returned results of a Javascript data file. Then I run into something akin to #437 because I cannot access collections.

[gerwitz]

I’ve tried iterating through a range (1–3000) and using .getFilteredByGlob() to weave in existing pages … but performance was abysmal.

So far it seems that generating files for the missing numbers with a gulp task is actually faster than any “smart” solution I’ve tried. But this feels icky so I continue to experiment.

[gerwitz]

For the record, I created a minimal case here: https://github.com/gerwitz/eleventy-sparse-collection

[gerwitz]

This would be trivial to implement with "virtual templates" #1612