Thread

Greetings,

To Brian: Thanks for the reassuring words!  Like you, I make my living as a Web developer.  I get nervous when the framework I spend most of my time using seems to be experiencing problems, and when I see one of the lead developers exiting the scene.  With that said, I don’t want to make too many assumptions about what that means.

I agree that CodeIgniter continues to just feel more intuitive.  That’s why I keep coming back to it.  Also, the documentation for CodeIgniter continues to be the best, for sure.

But there is a strange sense that CodeIgniter is falling behind a bit.  The tutorials here on the CodeIgniter site, and CodeIgniter tutorials from around the Web, are getting a bit old.  I think maybe CodeIgniter needs something to give it new life and energy.  I don’t know that there’s an easy answer to this, but it may be contributing to the problem.

Thanks,
Matthew

Sturgeon mostly contributed his time to CodeIgniter development, he reviewed bug fixes and contributions which he then pulled into the framework. He contributed only a few minor things to the CI codebase himself. He wasn’t a major CI developer as most of you seem to think.

Nobody should be concerned for the future of CodeIgniter, there are still quite a few people doing the same job that Sturgeon has vacated.

His moving on to other projects is no loss to CodeIgniter.

Everyone can be a volunteer for CI development.
It’s open source.

I don’t think we need to switch to another framework.
All we need is different version flavors for CodeIgniter with the same coding style as the original,
to match the other frameworks out there.

Just my opinon.

Hey guys,

My decision to leave the Reactor means absolutely nothing whatsoever for the state of CodeIgniter. While I am flattered by the kind words from many of you, I think you guys overestimate how much work I was actually doing.

As others have said my involvement over the last few months has been significantly reduced due to being involved with way too many projects. My role became mostly Peer Review for the code coming in, and very rarely was I actually writing new features. This was taking up an hour a day so it’s not quite as basic as Wired suggests - but he does like to be rude given the chance.

You’ve heard of my name because I blog a lot (it used to help me get freelance work). You’ve seen me fixing bugs because I needed them fixed for my client projects. I was only on the team because I asked EllisLab if I could be, and any of you can do the same. Before I left I put in a good word for Alex Bilbie who has been helping out plenty, and Andrey (narfbg) has been absolutely nailing it. toopay has been writing a f**kload of unit tests and people like Darren Hill have been truly dedicated to getting features like HMVC wrapped up.

He seemed arrogant and rude to people. I never really liked him

Sure am! I usually try to keep a cool temper but when you have people asking you to fix bugs, to implement features, complaining that you don’t immediately like their code even when it doesn’t follow the style guide or produces fatal errors - you will start shouting at people pretty quickly. Especially when all of that is being expected of you for free while you have client deadlines at the same time. It’s not all fun and games being involved with an open-source project, especially an insanely high-profile one like CodeIgniter.

So basically, nothing has changed, Alex and Narf are nailing it, 3.0 is still on it’s way and if I’ve pissed you off at any point let me know next time you’re in New York and we can have a beer. Or you can just hate me, whichever.

Thanks again everyone! :D

Greetings,

To Phil: Thanks for taking the time to post here! It’s reassuring.  I completely understand why you might become testy at times.  For whatever reason, I have never seen it as offensive.  It’s always seemed more honest and even amusing to me.  I especially love your DBAD license.

For me, it’s not that I’m worried about whether CodeIgniter will survive.  I’m just wanting it to reclaim its leading role, so I’m holding my breath for 3.0.  I am rooting for it, because I think it’s the best framework out there.  Like I’ve said, I think part of the way it will reclaim this position is if there could be a refresh of CI-related materials (outside tutorials, blog posts, videos, etc).  This does NOT include the CI User Guide, which continues to be the best.

Thanks,
Matthew

I don’t personally think any framework is going to take a “leading role” and maintain it forever. Does it matter if it does anyway? Use the framework that works for your current project and run with it. It’s simply another tool in your tool belt.

You should absolutely branch out and learn how to use other frameworks and languages as your time and desire permits. It doesn’t mean you’re abandoning CodeIgniter (which is a fantastic framework)... you’re just growing your own capabilities and experience which will land you more work and more money.

I’m just wanting it to reclaim its leading role

By that I assume you mean you want it to be cutting edge, bring awesome new features that other systems don’t have, etc? While I am certain that CodeIgniter is not going to randomly die or anything silly like that, “reclaiming its leading role” is not something I can see on the horizon.

CodeIgniter has always been about backward compatibility (with its own API and PHP versions) meaning that it cannot take advantage of PHP 5.3 features for a while yet - while other frameworks are wholeheartedly adopting namespaces. CakePHP is even adopting traits as it is PHP 5.4 only, which will change things entirely for them.

This is all really good as it means when you are stuck needing to build a project with PHP 5.2 you have a well documented framework to use, which a LOT of people are able to pick up and run with. This however will be considered really bad if you’re NOT one of those people who are stuck using PHP 5.2. That is anybody working solo, hosting their clients, building web-apps where they control the environment, etc.

The number of people requiring PHP 5.2 is dwindling (and quite rightly so) so one day when EllisLab no longer wish to support PHP 5.2 for ExpressionEngine they’ll be able to break that requirement and PHP 5.3 will be the minimum. At that point CodeIgniter could be rewritten to take advantage of awesome new PHP features suck as autoloading and namespaces, even PSR compliance, but that would break the API and as such everyone using CI would be forced to rewrite all of their applications - including EllisLab - so it’s in nobodies interests to do that.

CodeIgniter 3.0 was all about improving CI as much as possible without breaking everything for everyone, which it has managed to do and I am very proud to have been part of that. But at some point CI will need a total re-write to remain “up to date” with other frameworks - most of which are rewriting themselves all of the time.

FuelPHP 2.0 is a rewrite of FuelPHP 1.x.
Laravel 4 is a total rewrite of Laravel 3, which was a total rewrite of 1 and 2 (all done within the same year)
Kohana 1, 2 and 3 have all be total rewrites.
Symfony 1 and 2 are extremely different

Compare that to CodeIgniter which can be upgraded from 1.7.0 to 3.0 in about an hour.

Some frameworks are happy to rewrite, but this community has always been very happy that we’ve managed to avoid it. At the same time, if you want something that is bleeding edge you have to run the risk that the next version is going to totally break you application. You can’t have “slow and stable” and “fast and cool”.

So pick whichever you feel is best. CI will remain a logical choice for enterprise teams who want to KNOW their code wont change and have the ability to throw pretty much any junior developer at the source code, but people who want the “cool new stuff” will be using something else. That shouldn’t be an issue, and you shouldn’t be worried about it.

Greetings,

I should clarify that by “reclaim its leading role” I do not mean adopting bleeding-edge advances.  I like the stability of the framework, and I am not sure about some of the “improvements” in PHP 5.3.

I’m referring more to the outdated materials circling all around us for CodeIgniter.  Although each version of CodeIgniter is not a total re-write, tutorials from 1.7 or even 2.0 are different enough to be difficult to use.

It’s not CodeIgniter’s fault.  But when you search for tutorials or sample projects, or even go through the CodeIgniter Wiki pages, there is a feeling that the materials are getting old.  I know that part of this is an illusion—so much material exists out there for CodeIgniter.  But I wonder what it would take to revive the production of new non-Ellis Lab materials about CodeIgniter?

Thanks,
Matthew

But I wonder what it would take to revive the production of new non-Ellis Lab materials about CodeIgniter?

Write a blog?

Greetings,
Yes, I plan to do that!  But I’m commenting on a wider sense that goes beyond any single blogger.  Well, unless that blogger commands as much attention as a certain Brit with a sometimes abrasive, but always knowledgeable presence.

Bottom line for me: I am excited about CodeIgniter 3.0 and I’m rooting for both the framework itself and the constellation of materials and discussions that come up around it.

Thanks,
Matthew

Greetings,
I missed the troll!  Hate when that happens.

In some odd way, this discussion started out with me feeling uncertain about CI.  But now I feel certain again, and I have renewed interest in seeing CI 3.0!

Thanks,
Matthew

I’m going to go ahead and close this thread (and remove the personal jabs) so it doesn’t degrade further into a conversation about people’s opinions of one another. Let’s keep these forums civil and respectful and not use them as platforms to talk about why you do or don’t like someone and their work. Thanks!