Zopeists, Well, I have got it to work using the actual id's of the objects so it must be a syntax thing or a bug. Here's the code which renders correctly: <!--#with BigFolder--> <!--#with SubFolder--> <!--#var "_.getitem('foo',1)"--> <!--#/with--> <!--#/with--> The above code properly renders the HTML page from the object with id 'foo', just like it should, now 'foo' is stored in REQUEST['file'] from the previous form, and so I should be able to just say: <!--#with BigFolder--> <!--#with SubFolder--> <!--#var "_.getitem(_[_['file']],1)"--> <!--#/with--> <!--#/with--> Regretably that renders the proper page, but tacks on a traceback. I'm assuming the proper page is at the top because of some cache issue. Do I have to make a special type of reference to get a variable in the REQUEST namespace? For all of you going to the expo, Zope on! All my best, -- Jason Spisak webmaster@mtear.com