CODEWITHSUNDEEP
codeigniter
einav
einav

Reputation: 573

CodeIgniter: How to set default values for common variables across pages?

I'm building a website with CI, using a simple template system.

This is my basic template:

$this->load->view('includes/header');
$this->load->view($main_content);
$this->load->view('includes/footer');

I have a set of variables I want to pass to my views, and I know I can do it like this:

$data['title'] = 'title goes here';
$data['main_content'] = 'name of page goes here';
$this->load->view('template', $data);

So far - so good. But I want the above set of variables to have default values, so I won't have to declare the whole set every time I load my template.

The solution I came up with was declaring public static variables under my main controller, like so:

public static $default_data = array(
    'title' => 'Generic Title Goes Here',
    'main_content' => 'home_view'
);

Then I can load my views like this:

$data = Home::$default_data;
$data['main_content'] = 'member_login_view'; // I can now declare only the relevant variables. all the rest will have the default values
$this->load->view('includes/template', $data);

This method is working fine, but I have one problem with it: some of the variables I'd like to set as default are not static. For example, in the header I have a stats line showing the number of registered users on my website, and the number of products in my database. So I call it with 

$data['stats'] = $this->products_model->get_stats();

Is there a way set default values to such variables, so I won't have to call the method in the model before each page load?

Upvotes: 3

Views: 3832

Answers (1)

einav
einav

Reputation: 573

Found a solution. Hope it's a good one. Writing it down hoping it might help someone else.

I extended the main controller, and put all the common variables there - the static and the dynamic. I declared them as protected, so they are available to me across all views.

This is application/core/MY_Controller.php:

class Home_Controller extends CI_Controller {

//Class-wide variable to store stats line
protected $stats;
protected $title;
protected $main_content;

public function __construct() {

    parent::__construct();

    //Put stats in Class-wide variable
    $this->stats = $this->products_model->get_stats();

    //Store stats in $data
    $data->stats = $this->stats;

    $data->title = 'Generic Website title';

    $data->main_content = 'home_view';

    //Load variables in all views
    $this->load->vars($data);

}

}

And I changed the first line of my main controller to class Home extends Home_Controller instead of class Home extends CI_Controller.

Upvotes: 8

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