25.3. Create the Home Page

The Minesweeper game uses two different webpages: a home screen plus an active playing space. We need to build an HTML template for each page.

25.3.1. Review base.html

Since both game pages use the same <head> element, we can put that common code into a base template:

Example

Open base.html file to find this code:

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<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
   <head>
      <meta charset="UTF-8">
      <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width">
      <title>LCHS Minesweeper</title>
      <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"
         href="{{ url_for('static', filename='style.css') }}">
   </head>
</head>
<body>
   <h1>{{page_title}}</h1>
   {% block content %}
   {% endblock %}
</body>
</html>

Note the following:

  1. We link to a style.css file in line 8. It contains some basic styling rules for the game, and the tutorials won’t instruct you to change any of the settings. However, you absolutely CAN adjust the properties and values as you see fit! Don’t like the gray background on the board? Fix it!

  2. On line 13, the placeholder for the page title needs to be filled. Don’t forget to pass a value to page_title from each render_template() function.

  3. Feel free to add extra elements to base.html. Remember that this content will appear on any template that extends from the base.

25.3.2. Build index.html

The home screen for the game presents users with an inactive copy of the board, a menu for choosing the number of mines, and a space for instructions.

Showing the home screen for the LCHS Minesweeper game.

The LCHS Minesweeper home page.

Remember that our goal is to get the game working, so we will keep this page simple for now. We can always make improvements and add other features later!

Open your Minesweeper project and code along with the video as we build the HTML template:

25.3.3. Video Summary

  1. Our focus is to set up the structure for the home page. We won’t worry about placing the mines or collecting data from the form.

  2. The home page includes a title, one small form (Main Menu), an inactive copy of the game board, and a reserved space for game instructions.

  3. The form contains a single input field of type number. Other attributes include min and max values to encourage the user to select a reasonable number of mines. Adding some placeholder text inside the input box helps with the UI/UX.

  4. Use a table element to build the rows and columns in the game board.

    1. Use one <tr></tr> element for each row in the table.

    2. Inside each row element, use <th> or <td> tags for the individual cells. The number of cells in each row matches the number of columns we want in the table.

    3. Use one Jinja3 loop to display the column headings (1 - 10) at the top of the table.

    4. Use a nested pair of loops to display the row label or button in each individual cell.

  5. The text that appears on the board is stored in a session cookie. Column headings can be accessed from a list assigned to the session['columns'] key. Row data can be accessed from session['rows'].

Note

Remember, you don’t have to keep the default styling! Feel free to modify your project’s CSS file to change the appearance of the page.

If you wish, you can also link to the Bootstrap CSS library and use their classes to style your page.