Quick question:
I’ve been building sites and database systems using PHP for years and love it. I am now hiring a 3rd party to build out a web site (which will work with an app later) and they want to use CodeIgniter.
What’s the thoughts on this? Are there limitation to CodeIgniter? What issues can expect to see? I don’t want to turn out being like MySpace stuck with ColdFusion after the traffic gets popping.
All feedback appreciated.
Cheers!
Ryan
CodeIgniter is a nice framework, is open source and has a lot of support, so it’s probably a pretty safe bet. And it’s just PHP, anyway, rather than a different language.
Thanks for the reply. I looked at some sample codes and it looks like it is just a system with preconfigured classes and objects. Anything different than that? Seems like a bit of a headache learning it’s pre-built rules, but pretty easy to jump into if I needed to work on Codeigniter code later on? I’m proficient with PHP, so want to think it wouldn’t be too much of a headache.
Cheers
Ryan
Exactly, it is a framework, it provides a lot of underlying functionality for you (so you do not need to re-invent the wheel). Yes it will take some time to get used to the framework it has in place and how it is implemented, but it really isn’t that difficult to learn and I think you will find yourself leaning to using it more often than not after you learn it.
CodeIgniter can be used or abused to suit your particular requirements. It was first introduced way back January 2006, has had about 27 updates most of which are to ensure safety against hacking. Latest current stable version is 2.1.3. A Git development module is also available.
There are a “stack” of programmers available many who contribute to the user friendly forum. Wiki library or fork Gits.
CodeIgiter follows the MVC principle, is quick to get started, robust. Numerous databases are simplified and can be easily switched by using the Database Module and also their Active Record Class. All data is validated and “cleaned” unobtrusively in the background before any update or insertions are made thus making robust programming easier.
Their very small footprint makes it very fast. Updates and swapping versions is usually just a case of re-directing the index.php -> $system variable.
All in all it is a very robust, mature and structure framwork which certainly is far easier to follow than other programmer’s spaghetti structure.
NB I had to search for the collective noun for “programmers” and besides stack, other favourite are collection, fork, heap, module, nerd…