Load a node for a template file- in exactly the same way a node object is presented to a theme

Motivation for this function: sure, we could use a plain node_load($nid) and wrap every $node->field['0']['value'] in a check_plain or the function for rendering with the proper input format (check_plain). The proper format is available to be grabbed from the data provided by a regular node_load. But that's a lot of work and not the way we're used to theming things in .tpl.php

A module that provides a function "agaric_node_load_view($nid)" is attached. Here is that function, which could alternately be prefaced with phptemplate_ and kept in your theme's template.php file:

<?php
function agaric_node_load_view($nid, $teaser = FALSE, $page = FALSE, $links = TRUE) {
  $node = node_load($nid);
  $node = (object)$node;

  $node = node_build_content($node, $teaser, $page);

  if ($links) {
    $node->links = module_invoke_all('link', 'node', $node, $teaser);

    foreach (module_implements('link_alter') AS $module) {
      $function = $module .'_link_alter';
      $function($node, $node->links);
    }
  }

  // Set the proper node part, then unset unused $node part so that a bad
  // theme can not open a security hole.
  $content = drupal_render($node->content);
  if ($teaser) {
    $node->teaser = $content;
    unset($node->body);
  }
  else {
    $node->body = $content;
    unset($node->teaser);
  }

  // Allow modules to modify the fully-built node.
  node_invoke_nodeapi($node, 'alter', $teaser, $page);
 
  // return the node object in the same state it is handed to the theme layer
  return $node;
}
?>

Example of use in a node-custom.tpl.php (I know, I know, we should be putting this in template.php and passing variables in):

    <?php
    if (function_exists('bio_for_user')) {
      $bnid = bio_for_user($uid);     
      $bio = agaric_node_load_view($bnid);
    ?>

<div class="view-field view-data-field-city-value">
  <?php print $bio->field_city[0]['view'] ?>
</div>

<div class="view-field view-data-field-state-value">
  <?php print $bio->field_state[0]['view'] ?>
</div>

    <?php     
    }
    ?>

Backstory (IM chat excerpts): I can't believe there isn't a Drupal function for doing what I made that module for (to hold one function), but there really seems there isn't. It's basically the node_view function but I cut out before theme('node', $node) -- so that we get the same thing by calling this function as we do from inside a template file.

The module has no user interface. I guess it really should be a phptemplate_ function we put in all our themes, but actually it would be nicer to start abstracting that stuff to agaric.module -- easier to include for every site than copying template functions. And it'd be legit to share that with the community, even if blatantly branded ;-)

The road to getting to developing function/module:

<div class="codeblock"><code><span style="color: #000000"><span style="color: #0000BB">&lt;?php<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span><span style="color: #007700">if (</span><span style="color: #0000BB">function_exists</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'bio_for_user'</span><span style="color: #007700">)) {<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$bnid </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">bio_for_user</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$uid</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$bio </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">node_load</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$bnid</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$tbio </span><span style="color: #007700">= </span><span style="color: #0000BB">theme</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'node'</span><span style="color: #007700">,</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$bio</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br /></span><span style="color: #FF8000">// does not work - strangely empty output<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">drupal_set_message</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'&lt;pre&gt;'</span><span style="color: #007700">.</span><span style="color: #0000BB">print_r</span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$tbio</span><span style="color: #007700">,</span><span style="color: #0000BB">TRUE</span><span style="color: #007700">).</span><span style="color: #DD0000">'&lt;/pre&gt;'</span><span style="color: #007700">);<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">?&gt;</span></span></code></div>


<div class="field field-type-text field-field-city">
  <h3 class="field-label">City</h3>
  <div class="field-items">

      <div class="field-item"></div>
  </div>
</div> 

<div class="field field-type-text field-field-state">
  <h3 class="field-label">State</h3>
  <div class="field-items">
      <div class="field-item"></div>
  </div>
</div>

<h2>YOUR LIFE "ON THE OTHER SIDE OF CANCER"</h2>

<h2> MY STORY </h2>

  </div>

Aha! The answer is in http://api.drupal.org/api/function/node_view/5 ?

$node = node_build_content($node, $teaser, $page);
$content = drupal_render($node->content);

And then I just took the whole function.

Resolution