Home

Awesome

A PHP Application Starter, Version 3, Based on CodeIgniter

Project Repository

https://github.com/ivantcholakov/starter-public-edition-3

Note

This is an older version of the platform. Further efforts will be applied on Application Starter 4, which supports multiple applications. See https://github.com/ivantcholakov/starter-public-edition-4

PHP

If you are a beginner with little or no PHP experience, you might need to read a training tutorial like this one:

PHP Tutorial for Beginners: Learn in 7 Days, https://www.guru99.com/php-tutorials.html

CodeIgniter 3 Documentation

https://www.codeigniter.com/userguide3/

Requirements

PHP 8.0.2 or higher, Apache 2.4 (mod_rewrite should be enabled). For database support seek information within CodeIgniter 3 documentation.

For UTF-8 encoded sites it is highly recommendable the following PHP extensions to be installed:

Installation

Download source and place it on your web-server within its document root or within a sub-folder. Make the folder platform/writable to be writable. It is to contain CodeIgniter's cache, logs and other things that you might add. Open the site with a browser on an address like this: http://localhost/starter-public-edition-3/public/

On your web-server you may move one level up the content of the folder public, so the segment public from the address to disappear. Also you can move the folder platform to a folder outside the document root of the web server for increased security. After such a rearrangement open the file config.php (public/config.php before rearrangement), find the setting $PLATFORMPATH and change this path accordingly. The file public/config.php contains also the ENVIRONMENT setting that can be switched among development, testing, and production mode. By default ENVIRONMENT is set to 'production'.

The following directories (the locations are the original) must have writable access:

platform/upload/
platform/writable/
public/cache/
public/editor/
public/upload/

Have a look at the files .htaccess and robots.txt and adjust them for your site. The PHP configuration files of the application you may find at platform/application/config/ folder. Also, the common PHP configuration files you may find at platform/common/config/ folder.

The platform auto-detects its base URL address nevertheless its public part is on the document root of the web-server or not. However, on production installation, site should be accessed only through trusted host/server/domain names, see platform/common/config/config.php , the configuration settings $config['restrictAccessToTrustedHostsOnly'] and $config['trustedHosts'] for more information.

Installation on a developer's machine

In addition to the section above, it is desirable on a developer's machine additional components to be installed globally, they are mostly to support compilation of web resources (for example: less -> css, ts -> js). The system accesses them using PHP command-shell functions.

When installing the additional components globally, the command-line console would require administrative privileges.

node -v
npm -v

sudo npm install -g n

Updating Node.js:

sudo n lts

Updating npm:

sudo npm i -g npm

Updating all the globally installed packages:

sudo npm update -g

Another way for global updating is using the interactive utility npm-check. Installing:

sudo npm -g i npm-check

And then using it:

sudo npm-check -u -g

sudo npm install less -g

Then the following command should work:

lessc -v

sudo npm -g install postcss-cli

And this command should work:

postcss -v

sudo npm -g install autoprefixer

sudo npm -g install cssnano

sudo npm -g install typescript-compiler

This command should work:

tsc -v

On compilation of huge web-resources Node.js might exaust its memory, in such case try (the value may vary):

export NODE_OPTIONS=--max-old-space-size=8192

Coding Rules

For originally written code a tab is turned into four spaces. This is the only strict rule. Standard PSR rules are welcome, but it is desirable code not to be 'compressed' vertically, use more meaningful empty lines that would make code more readable and comfortable.

Additional Features

    modules/demo/controllers/page/Page.php     -> address: site_url/demo/page/[index/method]
    modules/demo/controllers/page/Other.php    -> address: site_url/demo/page/other/[index/method]

Deeper directory nesting as in CI 3 has not been implemented for now.

Instead of:

// Filename: Welcome.php
class Welcome extends Base_Controller {
    // ...
}

you can write:

// Filename: Welcome_controller.php
class Welcome_controller extends Base_Controller {
    // ...
}

Thus the class name Welcome is available to be used as a model name instead of those ugly names Welcome_model, Welcome_m, etc. The technique of this hack is available, but it is not mandatory.

How to use this feature:

Enable the configuration option 'parse_i18n':

$config['parse_i18n'] = TRUE;

Then in your views you can use the following syntax:

<i18n>translate_this</i18n>

or with parameters

<i18n replacement="John,McClane">dear</i18n>

where $lang['dear'] = 'Dear Mr. %s %s,';

Here is a way how to translate title, alt, placeholder and value attributes:

<img src="..." i18n:title="click_me" />

or with parameters

<img src="..." i18n:title="dear|John,McClane" />

You can override the global setting 'parse_i18n' within the controller by inserting the line:

$this->parse_i18n = TRUE; // or FALSE

Parsing of <i18n> tags is done on the final output buffer only when the MIME-type is 'text/html'.

Note: Enabling globally the i18n parser maybe is not the best idea. If you use HMVC, maybe it would be better i18n-parsing to be done selectively for particular html-fragments. See below on how to use the Parser class for this purpose.

Instead of:

$this->load->library('parser');

write the following:

$this->load->parser();

Quick tests:

// The default parser.
$this->load->parser();
echo $this->parser->parse_string('Hello, {name}!', array('name' => 'John'), TRUE);

There are some other parser-drivers implemented. Examples:

// Mustache parser.
$this->load->parser('mustache');
echo $this->mustache->parse_string('Hello, {{name}}!', array('name' => 'John'), TRUE);

// Parsing a Mustache type of view.
$email_content = $this->mustache->parse('email.mustache', array('name' => 'John'), TRUE);
echo $email_content;

// Textile parser
$this->load->parser('textile');
echo $this->textile->parse_string('h1. Hello!', NULL, TRUE);
echo $this->textile->parse('hello.textile', NULL, TRUE);

// Markdown parser
$this->load->parser('markdown');
echo $this->markdown->parse_string('# Hello!', NULL, TRUE);
echo $this->markdown->parse('hello.markdown', NULL, TRUE);

// Markdownify parser
$this->load->parser('markdownify');
echo $this->markdownify->parse_string('<h1>Hello!</h1>', NULL, TRUE);
echo $this->markdownify->parse('hello.html', NULL, TRUE);

// LESS parser
$this->load->parser('less');
echo $this->less->parse_string('@color: #4D926F; #header { color: @color; } h2 { color: @color; }', NULL, TRUE);
echo $this->less->parse(DEFAULTFCPATH.'assets/less/lib/bootstrap-3/bootstrap.less', NULL, TRUE);

Within the folder platform/common/libraries/Parser/drivers/ you may see all the additional parser drivers implemented. Also within the folder platform/common/config/ you may find the corresponding configuration files for the drivers, name by convention parser_driver_name.php. Better don't tweak the default configuration options, you may alter them directly on parser call where it is needed.

The simple CodeIgniter's parser driver-name is 'parser', you may use it according to CodeIgniter's manual.

Enanced syntax for using parsers (which I prefer)

Using the generic parser class directly, with specifying the desired driver:

$this->load->parser();

// The fourth parameter means Mustache parser that is loaded automatically.
echo $this->parser->parse_string($mustache_template, $data, true, 'mustache');

// The fourth parameter means Markdown and auto_link parsers parser to be applied in a chain.
echo $this->parser->parse_string($content, null, true, array('markdown', 'auto_link'));

// The same chaining example, this time a configuration option of the second parser has been altered.
echo $this->parser->parse_string($content, null, true, array('markdown', 'auto_link' => array('attributes' => 'target="_blank" rel="noopener"')));

Using parsers indirectly on rendering views:

// You don't need to load explicitly the parser library here.

// The fourth parameter means that i18n parser is to be applied.
// This is a way to handle internationalization on views selectively.
$this->load->view('main_menu_widget', $data, false, 'i18n');

Using a parser indirectly with Phil Sturgeon's Template library:

// You don't need to load explicitly the parser library here.

$this->template
    ->set(compact('success', 'messages', 'subject', 'body'))
    ->enable_parser_body('i18n')  // Not elegant enough, sorry.
    ->build('email_test');

Gulp/Webpack and etc. package managers from the Javascript world might be annoying burden for a PHP-developer. In order to make this matter easier, a web-asset compilator has been implemented, it uses internally the corresponding parsers. First, the compiler's tasks must be specified by names, see the configuration file platform/common/config/assets_compile.php.

Have a look at platform/common/config/assets_compile.php file. It contains a list of files (sources, destinations) to be used for LESS to CSS compilation. You may edit this list according to your needs. Before compilation, make sure that destination files (if exist) are writable and their containing folders are writable too. A simple example:

    ...
    [
        'name' => 'my_task',
        'type' => 'less',
        'source' => DEFAULTFCPATH.'themes/front_default/src/my.less',
        'destination' => DEFAULTFCPATH.'themes/front_default/src/my.min.css',
        'less' => [],
        'autoprefixer' => ['browsers' => ['> 1%', 'last 2 versions', 'Firefox ESR', 'Safari >= 7', 'iOS >= 7', 'ie >= 10', 'Edge >= 12', 'Android >= 4']],
        'cssmin' => [],
    ],
    ...

As you can see, there are source and destinations files, and a chain of parsers with their specific options. The type of the task here is the name of the first parser to be applied. Practically, more complex tasks might be needed when CSS and Javascripts are merged into a single result file. For this purpose there are two special task-types: 'merge_css' and 'merge_js', see an example:

    [
        'name' => 'front_default_css',
        'type' => 'merge_css',
        'destination' => DEFAULTFCPATH.'themes/front_default/css/front.min.css',
        'sources' => [
            [
                'source' => DEFAULTFCPATH.'themes/front_default/src/front.less',
                'type' => 'less',
                'less' => [],
                'autoprefixer' => ['browsers' => ['> 1%', 'last 2 versions', 'Firefox ESR', 'Safari >= 7', 'iOS >= 7', 'ie >= 10', 'Edge >= 12', 'Android >= 4']],
                'cssmin' => [],
            ],
            [
                'source' => DEFAULTFCPATH.'assets/scss/lib/sweetalert/sweetalert.scss',
                'type' => 'scss',
                'autoprefixer' => ['browsers' => ['> 1%', 'last 2 versions', 'Firefox ESR', 'Safari >= 7', 'iOS >= 7', 'ie >= 10', 'Edge >= 12', 'Android >= 4']],
                'cssmin' => [],
            ],
        ],
        'before' => '_prepare_semantic_source',
        'after' => [
            '_create_sha384',
            '_create_sha384_base64',
        ],
    ],

Within the example 'before' and 'after' elements are callbacks that do additional user-defined actions before and after the correspinding task is executed.

There is a defined special task-type 'copy' that allows merging already minified CSS or JavaScript without any processing.

Compilation is to be done from command-line. Open a terminal at the folder platform/public/ and write the following command:

php cli.php assets compile

Or, you may choose which tasks to execute by pointing at their names:

php cli.php assets compile task_name_1 task_name_2 task_name_3 ...

The Playground

It is hard everything about this platform to be documented in a formal way. This is why a special site section "The Playground" has been created, aimed at demonstration of platform's features/concepts. You may look at the examples and review their code.

A contact form has been created that with minimal adaptation you may use directly in your projects.

If you have no previous experience with CodeIgniter, get familiar with its User Guide first: https://www.codeigniter.com/user_guide/

Installed Composer Packages (Not a Full List)

PackageDescriptionUsage
codeigniter/frameworkCodeIgniter 3Everywhere
ivantcholakov/codeigniter-phpmailerThe wrapper library for PHPMailer.Sending emails
fg/multiplayerBuilds customizable video embed codes from any URLMultiplayer library
scssphp/scssphpA compiler for SCSS written in PHPParser 'scss' driver
guzzlehttp/guzzleA HTTP client libraryPlayground, REST service test
whichbrowser/parserUseragent sniffing library for PHPWhich_browser library
erusev/parsedownParser for MarkdownParser 'markdown' driver
erusev/parsedown-extraAn extension of Parsedown that adds support for Markdown ExtraParser 'markdown' driver
pixel418/markdownifyA HTML to Markdown converterParser 'markdownify' driver
mustache/mustacheA Mustache template engine implementation in PHPParser 'mustache' driver
netcarver/textileTextile markup language parserParser 'textile' driver
twig/twigTwig template language for PHPParser 'twig' driver
ezyang/htmlpurifierStandards compliant HTML filter written in PHPadmin and user HTML filters for the online editor
t1st3/php-json-minifyA JSON minifierParser 'jsonmin' driver
matthiasmullie/minifyCSS & JS minifierParser 'cssmin' and 'jsmin' drivers
phpmailer/phpmailerAn email creation and transfer component for PHPThe custom Email library

Real Life Usage

With a little bit older version of this platform the following sites have been created (Bulgarian language only):

Reported by Webnice Ltd., http://webnicebg.com

Credits

License Information

For original code in this project:
Copyright (c) 2012 - 2022:
Ivan Tcholakov (the initial author) ivantcholakov@gmail.com,
Gwenaël Gallon.
License: The MIT License (MIT), http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT

CodeIgniter:
Copyright (c) 2008 - 2014, EllisLab, Inc. (https://ellislab.com/)
Copyright (c) 2014 - 2019, British Columbia Institute of Technology (http://bcit.ca/)
Copyright (c) 2019 - 2022, CodeIgniter Foundation (https://codeigniter.com/)
License: The MIT License (MIT), http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT

Third parties:
License information is to be found directly within code and/or within additional files at corresponding folders.

Donations

Ivan Tcholakov, November 11-th, 2015: No donations are accepted here. If you wish to help, you need the time and the skills of being a direct contributor, by providing code/documentation and reporting issues. Period.