Building Data-Driven Apps

Overview

Working with data is a key part of building any application. In a typical application, you may need to load records and lists of records from a back-end service, display that data in your application's views, accept input from users that changes or creates new data, keep views in sync with the changing data, and persist the data to a back-end location. Enyo provides many features to make developing rich, data-driven applications as easy as possible using a minimal amount of code.

At the heart of Enyo's data layer is the concept of data observation and binding--the ability to observe changes to an object's properties and have the changes be automatically synced to properties of related objects. While this is most useful for binding view properties to your back-end data, bindings in Enyo are very flexible and may be created between any two Enyo objects.

All Enyo objects and components support binding by default when property values are changed using the set() method of enyo/Object. However, to make changes to properties observable on plain old JavaScript objects (e.g., JSON objects loaded from a back-end service), Enyo also provides enyo/Model, an object that wraps a plain JavaScript object and adds support for observation, thus allowing your back-end data to be easily bound to Enyo objects and controls. In addition, Enyo provides enyo/Collection, which wraps arrays of models and allows observation of additions to (and removals from) the collection.

Using these features, the properties of enyo/Object and enyo/Model instances may be bound to any view properties (which will then be automatically kept in sync with any object or model changes). Furthermore, "collection-aware" view kinds such as enyo/DataRepeater, enyo/DataList, and enyo/DataGridList, which generate repeated controls based on a list of data, may be bound to an enyo/Collection. The views will then be automatically re-rendered when the models in the collection change.

Finally, Enyo provides APIs on enyo/Model and enyo/Collection that let you easily fetch data from (and persist data to) back-end sources such as HTTP-based Ajax and Jsonp endpoints. You may also customize these APIs to accommodate other data sources, such as third-party libraries or SDKs, by subclassing and registering new enyo/Source objects.

Observers, Bindings, and Computed Properties

enyo/Component provides both declarative and programmatic APIs for observing property changes and binding properties of objects in the scope of the component.

Observers

In Enyo, an observer is simply a function that is called when the value of a property being observed changes. By convention, Enyo automatically calls change observers for properties in the form of <property>Changed() functions. For example:

    var MyControl = kind({
        name: 'MyControl',
        foo: '',
        fooChanged: function (oldValue) {    // Called when foo changes
            // Do something with 'this.foo'
        }
    });

In this example, fooChanged() will be called when foo is set with the set() method:

    tapHandler: function () {
        this.set('foo', 'bar');      // Causes fooChanged() to be called
    }

You may declare your own property change observers by adding entries to your kind's observers block:

    var MyControl = kind({
        name: 'MyControl',
        publicProperty: 10,
        _protectedProperty: 42,
        observers: [
            { method: 'watchValues', path: ['publicProperty', '_protectedProperty'] }
        ],
        watchValues: function (previous, current, property) {  // Called when either property changes
            // Do something with 'this.publicProperty' and 'this._protectedProperty'
        }
    });

Note that, as long as property changes are made via the set() function of enyo/Object, any property (published or otherwise) is observable. Also note that the long-form setters generated for published properties (e.g., setPublicProperty() for the current example) call the generic set() function internally.

After a kind has been created, you may add or remove observers programmatically using the addObserver() and removeObserver() functions on enyo/Object (provided by the enyo/ObserverSupport mixin).

Bindings

Bindings in Enyo are built on the basic observation capability outlined above. A binding is responsible for propagating property value changes between two points--the source and target of the binding. When the source of a binding changes, the new value is set to the target property.

You may declare bindings between properties in the scope of a component by adding entries to your kind's bindings block. In the following example, the binding will automatically keep the content of the label (label.content) in sync with the value of the slider (slider.value) as the user drags the slider knob.

    var
        kind = require('enyo/kind'),
        Slider = require('moonstone/Slider'),
        Control = require('enyo/Control');

    var MyValueSlider = kind({
        name: 'MyValueSlider',
        components: [
            {kind: Slider, name: 'slider'},
            {kind: Control, name: 'label'}
        ],
        bindings: [
            {from: '$.slider.value', to: '$.label.content'}
        ]
    });

Note that the source (from) and target (to) properties of the binding are specified as string paths. By convention, when the path starts with a dot (.) as in this example, the path is relative to this. If the path starts with a caret (^), the path is relative to the global scope.

By default, bindings are one-way, from the source to the target. However, a binding may be specified as "two-way" by setting the oneWay flag to false:

    var
        kind = require('enyo/kind'),
        Slider = require('moonstone/Slider'),
        Control = require('enyo/Control');

    kind({
        name: 'MyValueSlider',
        sliderValue: 10,    // Initial value of slider
        components: [
            {kind: Slider, name:'slider'},
            {kind: Control, name:'label'}
        ],
        bindings: [
            {from: 'sliderValue', to: '$.slider.value', oneWay: false},    // two-way binding
            {from: '$.slider.value', to: '$.label.content'}                // one-way binding
        ]
    });

Note that in two-way bindings, the order of the from and to values is still meaningful, since the initial value will be determined by the source (from) end. In the current example, we are binding the sliderValue property to the child slider's value property. At creation time, the binding will propagate the value of sliderValue to the child slider's value property (not the other way around), but on any subsequent changes to the child slider, value will be propagated from value back to sliderValue.

An optional transform function may be provided for a binding to transform the value as it passes from the source to the target (and vice-versa, for two-way bindings):

    var
        kind = require('enyo/kind'),
        Slider = require('moonstone/Slider'),
        Control = require('enyo/Control');

    var MyValueSlider = kind({
        name: 'MyValueSlider',
        components: [
            {kind: Slider, name:'slider', min: 0, max: 1},
            {kind: Control, name:'label'}
        ],
        bindings: [
            {from: '$.slider.value', to: '$.label.content', transform: function (val) {
                return 'The slider value is ' + Math.round(val * 100) + '%';
            }}
        ]
    });

If necessary, a bi-directional transform may be provided for a two-way binding; check the second argument to the transform function to determine the direction in which the binding is firing:

    {from: '$.slider.value', to: '$.input.value', oneWay:false, transform: function (val, dir) {
        if (dir == 1) { //source (`from`) setting value for target (`to`)
            return (val * 100) + '%';
        } else if (dir == 2) { //target (`to`) setting value for source (`from`)
            return parseInt(val) / 100;
        }
    }}

Computed Properties

Computed properties allow you to observe and bind to changes in properties that are computed based on one or more dependent properties. When any dependencies of the computed property change (resulting in a change to the computed value), observers and bindings for that property fire.

Here's a simple example of a computed property based on two properties:

    var MyForecastControl = kind({
        name: 'MyForecastControl',
        weather: 'sunny',
        city: 'San Francisco',
        computed: [
            { method: 'forecast', path: ['weather', 'city'] }    // 'forecast' method depends on properties in list
        ],
        forecast: function () {
            return 'It's always ' + this.get('weather') + ' in ' + this.get('city')
        }
    }); 

We may now bind the computed forecast property to a view control, e.g.:

    var MyForecastControl = kind({
        name: 'MyForecastControl',
        weather: 'sunny',
        city: 'San Francisco',
        components: [
            {kind: Control, name: 'forecastLabel'}
        ],
        bindings: [
            {from: 'forecast', to: '$.forecastLabel.content'}
        ],
        computed: [
            { method: 'forecast', path: ['weather', 'city'] }    // 'forecast' method depends on properties in list
        ],
        forecast: function () {
            return 'It's always ' + this.get('weather') + ' in ' + this.get('city')
        }
    });

Then, when either dependent property changes, the view will automatically update:

    this.set('weather', 'rainy');
    // forecastLabel's content becomes 'It's always rainy in San Francisco'

    this.set('city', 'Seattle');
    // forecastLabel's content becomes 'It's always rainy in Seattle'

Models

enyo/Model is a very lightweight base kind that is specially designed to wrap plain-old JavaScript objects (POJOs), such as data fetched as JSON from a remote server. It allows for observation and binding using the APIs described above.

Note that enyo/Model is NOT an enyo/Component; it may not be used within declarative components blocks, but is instead instanced using the new keyword. In fact, enyo/Model is not even derived from enyo/Object, as it is intended to be as lightweight as possible.

Creating and Using Models

A generic enyo/Model may be instanced and initialized by simply using the new keyword and passing the constructor an optional object containing the desired initial attribute values:

    var Model = require('enyo/Model');

    var myModel = new Model({
        name: 'Kevin', 
        hometown: 'San Francisco',
        avatar: '/assets/kevin.png',
        height: 6.0
    });

We may get and set properties of the model using the set() and get() functions, just as we would do with enyo/Object:

    myModel.get('name'); // returns 'Kevin'
    myModel.set('name', 'Bob');
    myModel.get('name'); // returns 'Bob'

The properties of the model may be observed or bound to properties of components or other models using the same API described above:

    var ContactView = kind({
        name: 'ContactView',
        personModel: null,
        components: [
            {kind: Image, name: 'avatar'},
            {kind: Control, name: 'nameLabel'},
            {kind: Control, name: 'townLabel'}
        ],
        bindings: [
            {from: 'personModel.name', to: '$.nameLabel.content'},
            {from: 'personModel.hometown', to: '$.townLabel.content'},
            {from: 'personModel.avatar', to: '$.avatar.src'}
        ]
    });

If we set the personModel property of a ContactView instance to a model with the expected schema, the avatar, name, and town components of the view will automatically be synced with the corresponding properties of the model:

    var Model = require('enyo/Model');

    var myModel = new Model({
        name: 'Kevin', 
        hometown: 'San Francisco',
        avatar: '/assets/kevin.png',
        height: 6.0
    });

    this.$.contactView.set('personModel', myModel);

Furthermore, if any properties of the model are changed, the view will automatically update:

    myModel.set('name', 'Bob');        // The 'nameLabel' component of the view will update

Creating Model Subkinds

You may subkind enyo/Model to provide an explicit schema and default values via the attributes property, or to override any other default behavior:

    var COntactModel = kind({
        name: 'ContactModel',
        kind: Model,
        attributes: {
            name: 'Unknown',
            hometown: 'Unknown',
            avatar: '/assets/unknown.png'
        }
    });

    var myModel = new ContactModel({
        name: 'Bob'        // other attributes will reflect the defaults in ContactModel
    });

Fetching Models from REST Endpoints

Although it is often useful to initialize a model using an object literal (as seen above), enyo/Model instances are often populated based on data from a remote source. To simplify this process, the Enyo data layer uses Sources to configure data endpoints.

In the following example, we create a ContactModel subkind, providing a getUrl() method to customize the URL for the REST endpoint for this resource. This allows us to pass along the model property that is used to reference the resource we need:

    var
        kind = require('enyo/kind'),
        Model = require('enyo/Model'),
        AjaxSource = require('enyo/AjaxSource');

    new AjaxSource({name: 'ajax'});

    var ContactModel = kind({
        name: 'ContactModel',
        kind: Model,
        source: 'ajax',
        getUrl: function () {
            return 'http://myservice.com/users/' + this.get('user_id');
        }
    });

    var myModel = new ContactModel({user_id: 1234});
    myModel.fetch();  // Results in an XHR request to http://myservice.com/users/1234

Parsing and Converting Fetched Data

Often, you may need to adjust or convert the structure of data returned from a service (especially one that you don't control) in order to make it suitable for use in your application. For this reason, enyo/Model provides a parse() API, to be called after the data is fetched but before the data is transferred to the internal attributes hash and observers are notified. To enable this feature, set the parse option to true.

For example, a service might return metadata about a request that is not relevant to the data for your model:

    {
        "status": {
            "error": "none",
            "last_request": 1230394903
        },
        "result": {
            "user_id": 1234,
            "name": "Kevin",
            "hometown": "San Francisco"
            "avatar": "/images/kevin.png",
            "height": 6.0
        }
    }

In this case, you could overload the parse() function to tell enyo/Model to only use the result sub-tree of the fetched data for the model attributes:

    var ContactModel = kind({
        name: 'ContactModel',
        kind: Model,
        options: {parse: true},
        source: 'ajax',
        url: 'http://myservice.com/users',
        getUrl: function () {
            return 'http://myservice.com/users/' + this.get('user_id');
        },
        parse: function (data) {        // incoming data contains {status:..., result:...}
            return data.result;        // returned data contains {user_id:..., name:..., ...}
        }
    });

If the data from the REST endpoint did not arrive in JSON format, you would also use parse() to parse the data (string) returned from the service into a JavaScript object. Although Enyo does not provide XML-to-JSON parsing as part of the core framework, there are several open-source libraries that provide this functionality, such as X2JS:

    kind({
        name: 'ContactModel',
        kind: Model,
        options: {parse: true},
        source: 'ajax',
        getUrl: function () {
            return 'http://myservice.com/users/' + this.get('user_id');
        },
        parser: new X2JS(),
        parse: function (data) {        // incoming data: '<root><user_id>1234</user_id><name>...</name>...</root>'
            var json = this.parser.xml_str2json(data);
            return json.root;        // returned data: {user_id:..., name:..., ...}
        }
    });

For performance, enyo/Model does not support binding to nested data structures within a model. If a service returns nested data that your app needs to bind to, you could use the parse() function to flatten the structure. For example, if the fetched model data looked like this...

    {
        "user_id": 1234,
        "name": "Kevin",
        "department": {
            "dept_id": 42,
            "name": "Encabulator Marketing"
        },
        "manager": {
            "user_id": 933,
            "name": "Gray"
        }
    }

...the following() parse function would wrap the department and manager fields with enyo/Model, making those nested sub-objects bindable as well:

    var ContactModel = kind({
        name: 'ContactModel',
        kind: Model,
        options: {parse: true},
        source: 'ajax',
        getUrl: function () {
            return 'http://myservice.com/users/' + this.get('user_id');
        },
        parse: function (data) {
            data.dept_id = data.department.dept_id;
            data.dept_name = data.department.name;
            delete data.department;
            data.manager_id = data.manager.user_id;
            data.manager_name = data.manager.name;
            delete data.manager;
            return data;
        }
    });

Collections

While enyo/Model wraps plain JavaScript objects to make them observable, enyo/Collection wraps arrays of JavaScript objects, providing observation support for the addition of objects to (and removal of objects from) the array, and automatically "upgrading" plain JavaScript objects to enyo/Model status.

Note: Although collections have many features and APIs in common with enyo/Model, such as the ability to fetch and parse data from a back-end server, enyo/Collection is actually a subkind of enyo/Component. As such, a collection may be instantiated either declaratively, in the components block of a component or control, or programmatically, using the standard keyword new.

Creating and Using Collections

A generic enyo/Collection may be instanced and initialized by simply using the new keyword and passing the constructor an optional object containing the initial model data:

    var Collection = require('enyo/Collection');

    var myCollection = new Collection([
        {
            name: 'Kevin', 
            hometown: 'San Francisco',
            avatar: '/assets/kevin.png',
            height: 6.0
        },
        {
            name: 'Gray', 
            hometown: 'San Jose',
            avatar: '/assets/gray.png',
            height: 6.1
        },
        {
            name: 'Cole', 
            hometown: 'Santa Clara',
            avatar: '/assets/cole.png',
            height: 5.9
        }
    ]);

We can retrieve models from the collection using the at() function:

    myCollection.at(0);                 // returns enyo/Model instance for 'Kevin' record
    myCollection.at(2).get('name');     // returns 'Cole'

We can add models using the add() function. Note that add() will accept either enyo/Model objects or plain JavaScript objects. The latter are converted into enyo/Model objects when first retrieved.

    myCollection.add({name: 'Ben', hometown: 'Austin'});
    myCollection.at(myCollection.length-1).get('name'); // returns 'Ben'

    myCollection.add(new ContactModel({name: 'Aaron', hometown: 'San Mateo'}));
    myCollection.at(myCollection.length-1).get('name'); // returns 'Aaron'

See the documentation for enyo/Collection for the full list of APIs available for manipulating records.

Creating Collection Subkinds

You may subkind enyo/Collection to indicate an explicit model type to be used for wrapping its array data, or to override any other default behavior:

    var MyContactCollection = kind({
        name: 'MyContactCollection',
        kind: Collection,
        model: ContactModel
    });

    var myCollection = new MyContactCollection([
        {
            name: 'Kevin', 
            hometown: 'San Francisco',
            avatar: '/assets/kevin.png',
            height: 6.0
        },
        ...
    ]);

    myCollection.at(0);        // returns instance of 'MyContactModel' for 'Kevin' record

Fetching Collections from REST Endpoints

Like enyo/Model, enyo/Collection uses sources for fetching array data from REST endpoints. Specify the resource's url and call fetch() to retrieve data.

In the following example, the collection is loaded from a fixed URL:

    var
        kind = require(enyo/kind),
        AjaxSource = require('enyo/AjaxSource'),
        Collection = require('enyo/Collection');

    new AjaxSource({name: 'ajax'});

    var MyContactCollection = kind({
        name: 'MyContactCollection',
        kind: Collection,
        source: 'ajax',
        url: 'http://myservice.com/users'
    });

    var myCollection = new MyContactCollection();
    myCollection.fetch();

If the URL for the collection needs to be customized, simply overload getUrl() to provide a custom URL--based on properties of the collection, for example:

    var MyContactCollection = kind({
        name: 'MyContactCollection',
        kind: Collection,
        source: 'ajax',
        getUrl: function () {
            return 'http://myservice.com/departments/' + this.get('dept_id') + '/users';
        }
    });

    new MyContactCollection({dept_id: 42});
    myCollection.fetch();

Parsing and Converting Fetched Data

Also like enyo/Model, enyo/Collection has a parse() function to allow fetched data to be processed before being used.

For example, if your service provided request metadata in addition to the data array...

    {
        "status": {
            "error": "none",
            "last_request": 1230394903
        },
        "result": [
            {
                "user_id": 1234,
                "name": "Kevin",
                "hometown": "San Francisco"
                "avatar": "/images/kevin.png",
                "height": 6.0
            },
            {
                "user_id": 2345,
                "name": "Gray",
                "hometown": "San Jose"
                "avatar": "/images/gray.png",
                "height": 6.1
            },
            {
                "user_id": 4567,
                "name": "Cole",
                "hometown": "Santa Clara"
                "avatar": "/images/cole.png",
                "height": 5.9
            }
        ]
    }

...you could implement the following function to use only the result sub-array:

    var MycontactCollection = kind({
        name: 'MyContactCollection',
        kind: Collection,
        options: {parse: true},
        source: 'ajax',
        url: 'http://myservice.com/users'
        parse: function (data) {        // incoming data contains {status:..., result:...}
            return data.result;        // returned data contains {[{user_id:..., name:...}, {...}]}
        }
    });

Sources

Overview

enyo/Source is an abstraction provided by Enyo's data layer that encapsulates knowledge of how to fetch models from and commit collections to a data source. The data source could be a remote service exposed as REST endpoints accessed via Ajax or Jsonp, a complex Web API accessed through a third-party JavaScript library, or even localStorage.

The abstract API for enyo/Source is as follows:

Enyo currently provides default sources for Ajax and Jsonp REST endpoints via the enyo/AjaxSource and enyo/JsonpSource subkinds, respectively.

Specifying a source

When defining a custom enyo/Model or enyo/Collection subkind, you must specify the source property to indicate which source to use for fetching and committing records, using the shorthand name for the source (e.g., 'ajax', 'jsonp', etc.).

For example:

    var MyContactCollection = kind({
        name: 'MyContactCollection',
        kind: Collection,
        model: MyContactModel,
        url: 'http://myservice.com/users',
        source: 'jsonp'        // use jsonp source instead of ajax for fetching
    });

Creating Source Subkinds

You may subkind existing sources to specify options to configure the fetching strategy, or to create brand new sources for accessing data not supported by existing source kinds. Newly-created sources must be registered with the data layer by instantiating a source with a name.

For example, to create a subkind of enyo/JsonpSource to provide a custom callback property required by the JSONP endpoint, you could do the following:

    var MyJsonpSource = kind({
        name: 'MyJsonpSource',
        kind: JsonpSource,
        fetch: function (opts) {
            opts.callbackName = 'kallback';
            this.inherited(arguments);
        }
    });
    new MyJsonpSource({name: 'mysource'});

To create a brand new source, implement the abstract API as necessary:

    var MySource = kind({
        name: 'MySource',
        kind: Source,
        fetch: function (rec, opts) {
            // implement code to fetch records
            opts.success(data);        // call success callback to return data
        },
        commit: function (rec, opts) {
            // implement code to store records
            opts.success();        // call success callback
        },
        destroy: function (rec, opts) {
            // implement code to destroy records
            opts.success();        // call success callback
        },
        find: function (rec, opts) {
            // implement code to find records
            opts.success(data);        // call success callback to return data
        },
    });
    new MySource({name: 'mysource'});

As an example, you could easily implement an enyo/Source that uses the Facebook JavaScript SDK to read or add posts to a user's news feed as follows. (Note that the authentication required for this particular SDK is out of the scope of this article.)

    var FacebookFeedSource = kind({
        name: 'FacebookFeedSource',
        kind: Source,
        fetch: function (rec, opts) {
            var resource;
            if (rec instanceof Collection) {
                var user = rec.get('user') || 'me';
                resource = '/' + user + '/feed';
            } else {
                resource = '/' + rec.id;
            }
            FB.api(resource, function (response) {
                if (response && !response.error) {
                    opts.success(response);
                } else {
                    opts.fail(response);
                }
            });
        },
        commit: function (rec, opts) {
            if (rec.isNew) {
                FB.api('/me/feed', 'POST', rec, function (response) {
                    if (response && !response.error) {
                        opts.success(response);
                    } else {
                        opts.fail(response);
                    }
                });
            } else {
                opts.fail();  // FB only supports adding new posts, not editing
            }
        },
        destroy: function (rec, opts) {
            FB.api(rec.id, 'DELETE', function (response) {
                if (response && !response.error) {
                    opts.success(response);
                } else {
                    opts.fail(response);
                }
            });
        }
    });
    new FacebookFeedSource({name: 'fbfeed'});

Binding Models and Collections to Views

As discussed above, in Enyo we can easily bind properties from any enyo/Object or enyo/Model to properties of the controls that make up your app views. Without using bindings, one would typically initialize the view's properties programmatically and handle view events programmatically to keep the view and model data in sync.

Binding to Normal View Properties

The following example features a view that gets its data from a model with name and value properties. The slider value, input value, and name label are initialized based on the model at creation time. The value property may be changed by dragging the slider or typing in the input, and when the change is complete, the new value should be reflected in the model.

This is the typical way to implement such a view without using bindings:

    var
        kind = require('enyo/kind'),
        Control = require('enyo/Control'),
        Slider = require('onyx/Slider'),
        Input = require('enyo/Input');

    var MyControl = kind({
        name: 'MyControl',
        model: null,
        components: [
            {kind: Control, name: 'nameLabel'},
            {kind: Slider, name: 'slider', onChanging: 'sliderChanging'},
            {kind: Input, name: 'input', oninput: 'inputChanged'}
        ],
        create: function () {
            this.inherited(arguments);
            this.set('$.nameLabel.content', this.get('model.name'));
            this.set('$.slider.value', this.get('model.value'));
            this.set('$.input.value', this.get('model.value'));
        },
        sliderChanging: function (sender, ev) {
            this.set('$.input.value', ev.value);
            this.set('model.value', ev.value)
        },
        inputChanged: function (sender, ev) {
            this.set('$.slider.value', sender.get('value'));
            this.set('model.value', sender.get('value'));
        }
    });

Link to jsFiddle

Using bindings, the implementation requires significantly less code, and may be done completely declaratively, making your code easier to read and maintain:

    var MyControl = kind({
        name: 'MyControl',
        model: null,
        components: [
            {kind: Control, name: 'nameLabel'},
            {kind: Slider, name: 'slider', onChanging: 'sliderChanging'},
            {kind: Input, name: 'input', oninput: 'inputChanged'}
        ],
        bindings: [
            {from: 'model.name', to: '$.nameLabel.content'},
            {from: 'model.value', to: '$.slider.value', oneWay: false},
            {from: 'model.value', to: '$.input.value', oneWay: false}
        ]
    });

Link to jsFiddle

Binding in Collection-Aware Controls

Enyo includes several "collection-aware" controls, whose APIs allow you to pass in an enyo/Collection; child controls are then automatically generated based on the data in the collection, and are kept in sync with changes made to the underlying collection and models.

The base kind for these controls is enyo/DataRepeater. This is similar to enyo/Repeater in that its child controls serve as a template for controls to be generated by the repeater (one for each child in the underlying data set). However, instead of setting a count and responding to setupItem events to sync generated controls to the data models, enyo/DataRepeater generates one control for each model in the collection and then assigns the corresponding model to each control, allowing bindings on that control to sync data to and from the models.

Without collections or bindings, one might implement a simple repeater as follows:

    var SimpleRepeater = kind({
        name: 'SimpleRepeater',
        data: null, // expects plain JS array array
        components: [
            {kind: Repeater, name: 'repeater', onSetupItem: 'setupItem', components: [
                {kind: Control, name: 'nameLabel'},
                {kind: Control, name: 'ageLabel'}
            ]}
        ],
        create: function () {
            this.inherited(arguments);
            this.dataChanged();
        },
        dataChanged: function () {
            if (this.data) {
                this.$.repeater.set('count', data.length);
            }
        },
        setupItem: function (sender, ev) {
            var record = this.data[ev.index];
            this.$.nameLabel.set('content', record.name);
            this.$.ageLabel.set('content', record.age);
        }
    });

However, this code has a significant downside: if any records in the data array change, this kind has no way of knowing. Additional communication would be needed between the kind that is changing records and this view in order to know that the repeater needs to be refreshed.

By contrast, using the collection-aware enyo/DataRepeater with an enyo/Collection will let us implement the view with much less code, with the DataRepeater automatically keeping the view in sync when records in the collection are changed:

    var MyView = kind({
        name: 'MyView',
        data: null, // expects an enyo/Collection
        components: [
            {kind: DataRepeater, name: 'repeater', components: [
                {
                    components: [
                        {kind: Control, name: 'nameLabel'},
                        {kind: Control, name: 'ageLabel'}
                    ],
                    bindings: [
                        {from: 'model.name', to: '$.nameLabel.content'},
                        {from: 'model.age', to: '$.ageLabel.content'}
                    ]
                }
            ]}
        ]
    });