
Sparks: A Package Management System for Codeigniter - katzgrau
http://www.readwriteweb.com/hack/2011/03/sparks-a-package-management-system-for-codeigniter.php?sms_ss=hackernews&at_xt=4d7c456bb83ca796%2C0
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pak
I wish more attention would return to Kohana (kohanaframework.org), which is
basically CodeIgniter done better by a community of coders, except the
documentation for 3.x is sparse and IMO certain things in 2.x were better.

This idea for CI is nice, but the video reminded me of one of the more
annoying parts of CI: $this->load->whatever()ing everything, which should be
rightfully obsoleted for everybody running PHP5 as it is in Kohana, because
PHP can autoload classes with your own custom __autoload() function. It's
wasted effort to manually load everything and the collisions created in the
local namespace are intolerable.

~~~
pan69
Kohana 3.x has nothing to do with the Codeigniter framework. Even Kohana 2.x
was a complete rewrite from Codeigniter.

Kohana is indeed a much modern PHP MVC framework. It supports a cascading
file-system and HMVC out of the box. There is a lack a polished documentation
but I've been working with Kohana 3.x since it's release and the documentation
hasn't been much of an issue.

However, if you're new to MVC and/or programming Codeigniter might be a better
choice.

Concerning the post. I'm not sure how useful this is. The amount of time you
spend installing modules/plugins is disproportional to the amount of time you
spend on building your site. Normally you end up using a handful of modules
over and over again anyway.

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katzgrau
I think this'll be a big deal.

While I do have to agree with pak about the ugliness (and annoying semantics)
of $this->load->thing(), it was something the CI team had to keep around since
the framework was already very successful in the wild, and the devs had their
backs against the wall to support PHP 4. The Kohana team (or any newer
framework) had the benefit of initially not needing to appease anybody when
they wanted to build something for pure PHP 5.

Kohana had great beginnings, and I used it to develop a major website owned by
NBC. The most annoying part of using it? The documentation was sorely lacking,
and class names were inconsistent at best. At least docs are something that
can change for the better quickly, but broken docs are something that have
persisted through 2.x and 3.x.

Beauty is not something CodeIgniter has going for it. In fact, if you agree
with that, you're likely to agree that PHP in general in an ugly language. But
CodeIgniter has gained it's loyalty and reputation because of:

1\. Speed - It's always at the top of PHP framework benchmarks, and use of
minimal resources is ingrained in it's design philosophy

2\. Documentation - It has the best documentation of any framework that I've
seen or used

3\. Principle of Least Astonishment - There is little magic in CodeIgniter,
and things in CI only happen because you told CI to do it. Like
$this->load->view(). It means more typing, but it's logical, and explicitly
stated.

CodeIgniter has a big user-base, and it's weathered time, which is more than
other frameworks for the language can say. Now, users are begging the Reactor
team to add libraries and helpers to the framework as features. The Reactor
team's goal is to keep CI light and fast — the idea is to pack a lot of power
in a small footprint.

That's where Sparks comes in. It's not just about easily installable libs
(@pan69), it's about keeping the core framework ultra-light and doing what a
framework should be doing.

I think sparks is going to help CodeIgniter cement its place as a staple PHP
framework, which really doesn't exist for the language. Newer frameworks with
snazzier syntax and cool features will always pop up, but the Reactor team
plans to make it /the/ primary framework to use for PHP.

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ianl
I hope they add db migrations soon, the reactor has really breathed life back
into the CodeIgniter community. However, I'm still in love with FuelPHP for
PHP Frameworks.

