Modular CI

[b]Introduction:[/b]

Modular extensions for CodeIgniter have been around for quite some time: Modular Extensions, HMVC, Matchbox and Modular Separation.

While designing an application framework based on CodeIgniter, I needed a much more flexible system than what is on offer by the extensions mentioned above.

A module in my definition was a complete CodeIgniter mini-application. It needed to support all elements you have in a regular application folder: controllers, models, views, libraries and helpers. All these elements must be loadable using the CodeIgniter standard, via $this->load. And this included controllers loading other controllers, and models loading other models, to support true HMVC. At the same time, the solution should support modulair routing. Not with a fixed format (for example the first URI segment has to be the module name), but using regular CI routing. Also, I wanted as little impact on a standard CodeIgniter installation, as every extension of a core library method might break some CodeIgniter functionality in the future.

[b]Features:[/b]

• Location of your modules is configurable
• Supports routing to a module controller
• Supports cross module calls, also to controller methods
• Uses standard CodeIgniter routing, no Router library modifications
• Support for both version 1.7.2 and 2.0
• Support for the default index() method and the _remap() method

[b]Solution:[/b]

The new Module library can be loaded from inside your controller, like any other library: [code]$this->load->library('module', array('path' => 'modules') );[/code]

You can pass a config array to the library to define the location of your modules. This path is relative to your application directory. You can also use a configuration file for this purpose.

You can also load the Module library via the autoload config file. If you do, you have to use a configuration file to inform the library of the location of your modules: [code]<?php if ( ! defined('BASEPATH')) exit('No direct script access allowed');

/*
Modules path
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

| | This variable must contain the name of your "modules" folder. | Include the path if the folder is not in the same directory | as you applications index.php file. | */

$config['path'] = 'modules';

/* End of file module.php / / Location: ./application/config/module.php */[/code]

Once the Module library is loaded, you can initialize a module by using: [code]// Make the "my_module" module available to us $this->module->load('my_module');[/code]

This is all you have to do. From this moment on, all files from this module can be accessed in a way similar to the way you would normally load them: [code]// call a method in a library of our module $this->my_module->library->testlib->func('varA', 'varB');

// call a method in a model of our module $this->my_module->model->testmodel->func('var1', 'var2');

// call a method in a controller of our module $this->my_module->controller->testcntrlr->func('varX', 'varY', 'varZ');

// load a view from our module $this->my_module->view('test');

// load a helper from our module $this->my_module->helper('test');

// and see if it works testhelper();[/code]

[b]Download:[/b] The latest version of the zip file can be found in the forum thread.

[b]Discuss:[/b] See this [url=http://codeigniter.com/forums/viewthread/164350/]forum thread[/url].

Developed by WanWizard