Glossary

Terms used throughout these docs and the codebase, defined precisely because several of them share a word with an unrelated concept nearby.

partial

The main content selected for a request, either a Django 6 native {% partialdef %} block ("#name"), or a standalone template path. Set via render_nav(partial=...) / PartialSpec. This matches Django’s own term for {% partialdef %}/{% partial %}.

Swap

The htmx_nav.Swap dataclass: an additional HTML fragment delivered alongside the main partial on an HTMX request, via out-of-band (OOB) delivery or an <hx-partial> wrapper. Distinguish from:

• swap (lowercase, unqualified) — HTMX’s general term for any DOM update, used only in an HTMX-general sense in these docs.

• OOB swap — a Swap rendered with wrap="oob" (the default): <div id="..." hx-swap-oob="...">.

• <hx-partial> swap — a Swap rendered with wrap="hx-partial": <hx-partial hx-target="#..." hx-swap="...">. Named for the HTML element it emits, unrelated to “partial” above.

target_id

The DOM element id a Swap is delivered to. The id="..." / hx-target="#..." value in its rendered wrapper.

HX-Target / htmx_target_is() / targeting()

HX-Target is the request header attribute HTMX sends and specifies which DOM element will receive the partial. htmx_target_is(request, "foo") / targeting("foo") read that header.

shell / shell renderer

A ShellRenderer (built by make_shell_renderer) always includes a fixed set of navigational Swaps, sidebar, breadcrumbs, etc, chosen by request. “Shell” refers to that fixed set + it’s wrapping renderer, not any single template file.

variant

Example-project-only term: one of the three (or more) full implementations under example/ being compared, mpa, vanilla_htmx and htmx_nav_*. Not used anywhere in the htmx_nav package itself.