Codeigniter as a PHP Framework and its Advantages

What is Codeigniter?

Codeigniter is a PHP framework based on MVC (Model, Views, Controller) architecture, used for web development.  Codeigniter is a powerful, lightweight and very small footprint, build for small to medium scale applications. We can build a full-featured app using Codeigniter. I prefer Codeigniter for medium-scale applications.

MCV Architecture

What do you understand by the above picture? Let's take a look at each terminology.

VIEW

A view is nothing but an HTML document, for example, the page you are currently viewing. These pages or documents are rendered with the data fetched by MODEL.

MODEL

Model is a PHP file obviously written in PHP to handle DATABASE transactions basically CRUD(Create, Read, Update, Delete) operations. A specific function is written for a specific transaction.

CONTROLLER

A controller is designed such that it handles the VIEWS and MODEL. All client requests first get to the controller, then the controller processes the incoming requests. A request is nothing but what a user wants as a response, for example, a user wants to view a page with his/her profile. 

Codeigniter is pretty straightforward to learn, develop and deploy. If you are already familiar with PHP and want to build applications rapidly, you can learn Codeigniter framework and start developing. Why is it easy to deploy? because you know any Linux server supports PHP.

Get Started

Some outstanding features of Codeigniter-

1. The framework is very light and small-- Only 2 MB framework can do magical things. Download and start developing.
2. Exceptional Performance-- Highly optimized that helps in fast execution. 
3. Clear Documentation-- I love its documentation. Whenever you need to find something, Its clearer documentation helps a lot.
4. Strong Security-- When we develop apps using core PHP sometimes we don't too much care about the security. Codeigniter takes security seriously. it protects you app form CSRF and XSS attacks.
5. Basic configurations-- After downloading the Codeigniter, you just need to configure SITE URL or BASE URL and the Database and you are good to go. Directories are already created for the configurations.