# Using $.Scratch to redefine classes in partial depending on context/layout

**URL:** <https://discourse.gohugo.io/t/using-scratch-to-redefine-classes-in-partial-depending-on-context-layout/3960>\
**Category:** support\
**Created:** [August 22, 2016, 7:27pm UTC](https://discourse.gohugo.io/t/using-scratch-to-redefine-classes-in-partial-depending-on-context-layout/3960 "2016-08-22T19:27:10Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![rdwatters](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.gohugo.io/rdwatters/32/2848_2.png) [@rdwatters](https://discourse.gohugo.io/u/rdwatters)\
**Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 7:27pm UTC](https://discourse.gohugo.io/t/using-scratch-to-redefine-classes-in-partial-depending-on-context-layout/3960/1 "2016-08-22T19:27:10Z")

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Perhaps this isn’t the best use of scratch. I have created a `hero` partial that I want to use across a few different areas of the site, but the classes and content therein will change according to context. There are three hero types:

- Homepage: `index.html`
- List/section/node: `layouts/section/thesectionname.html`
- Individual page: `layouts/thesectionname/single.html`

Here is where it gets tricky. The “hero” of the homepage (`layouts/index.html`) is the most recently published blog post, which I am presenting as the “featured article.” Each section homepage (ie, `layouts/section/thesectionname.html`) has a “section hero” that has less markup than the homepage hero. Each single blog post (`layouts/blog/single.html`) also contains a hero with the title, publish date, etc of that individual post but does _not_ include all the “featured article” pieces as that of the homepage hero.

1. Here is my `partials/components/hero.html`:

2. Homepage hero. This is actually the most recently published blog post. This works A-okay in terms of surfacing what I need to the site homepage.

3. Post hero. This is at the top of `layouts/blog/single.html`

However, regardless of where I put `{{$pagetype}}`, I am getting the string “single-post,” when what I want to get is “homepage” on the homepage and “single-post” at the single-page level. I think this has to do with the range on the homepage, which is using `where` to loop through the individual posts, so I understand the context to be within the `blog/posts` rather than in the context of the homepage when calling the `hero.html` partial.

Any help would be **_greatly_** appreciated.

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**Author:** ![bep](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.gohugo.io/bep/32/3332_2.png) [@bep](https://discourse.gohugo.io/u/bep)\
**Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 8:02pm UTC](https://discourse.gohugo.io/t/using-scratch-to-redefine-classes-in-partial-depending-on-context-layout/3960/2 "2016-08-22T20:02:38Z")

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> [@rdwatters](#):
>
> {{partial “components/hero.html” . }}

The “dot” above will not contain the Scratch for the homepage.

Try sending $., or if you really need both, have a look at the `dict` func and maybe send the scratch as an explicit object.

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**Author:** ![hnarayanan](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.gohugo.io/hnarayanan/32/4547_2.png) [@hnarayanan](https://discourse.gohugo.io/u/hnarayanan)\
**Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 8:22pm UTC](https://discourse.gohugo.io/t/using-scratch-to-redefine-classes-in-partial-depending-on-context-layout/3960/3 "2016-08-22T20:22:07Z")

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I am not sure I completely understand your question, but I think you can also attempt to use `data` and `.Data.foo` in your template to achieve your goals. You can e.g. put things into a dictionary in a data file indexed by URLs/parts of the URLs and then look them up later.

I do a baby version of this in my personal site where I set the description meta tag in my header partial depending on the type of content. This is a workaround to sections/nodes not having their own consistent metadata store, which is what I think you’re trying to workaround too.

[https://github.com/hnarayanan/harishnarayanan.org/blob/master/data/Descriptions.yml](https://github.com/hnarayanan/harishnarayanan.org/blob/master/data/Descriptions.yml)

> <https://github.com/hnarayanan/harishnarayanan.org/blob/master/layout/partials/header.html>

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![rdwatters](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/discourse.gohugo.io/rdwatters/32/2848_2.png) [@rdwatters](https://discourse.gohugo.io/u/rdwatters)\
**Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 11:44pm UTC](https://discourse.gohugo.io/t/using-scratch-to-redefine-classes-in-partial-depending-on-context-layout/3960/4 "2016-08-22T23:44:06Z")

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HI @hnarayanan thanks for the input, but I’m already leveraging `data` for all my section descriptions, but this is not what I’m looking to do. But you provide a good use case for using data, to be sure 🙂

@bep Thanks. I’ll give that a shot. Have not used `dict` at all yet.