7 CodeIgniter Best Practices for Custom Web Development

Web development reached new levels of evolutions in 2020. With office work to business transactions moving online, the web almost replaced the physical world early in the pandemic. That also meant businesses, offices, and consumers alike needed digital platforms of one kind or another. These new and unpredicted trends caused massive demands for custom solutions, including websites and web apps.

Web developers have long relied on frameworks like CodeIgniter to build deeply customized sites and applications. Amid this new wave of digital transformation, businesses are increasingly adopting CodeIgniter website development services and similar offerings. At the same time, web developers are facing growing pressure to ramp up their coding skills. Most clients now demand more functionality than ever —in less time! That’s why you need to maintain some best practices. 

 

What Is CodeIgniter for web development? 

 

CodeIgniter is a PHP framework based on the MVC model. It enables software developers to build high-performance and dynamic web solutions. Equipped with an extensive range of libraries and third-party tools, CodeIgniter makes web development easier. It offers a pre-built application structure, enabling developers to use libraries and integrate packages. That means using CodeIgniter website development services you could significantly reduce time to market. Nonetheless, it takes a set of best practices to get the desired results from CodeIgniter. 

 

CodeIgniter Web Development Best Practices 

 

Below are seven software development best practices that help you get the desired results from the CodeIgniter framework.

1. Use default application structure 

Using the model-view-controller (MVC) architecture, CodeIgniter lets you establish a connection with databases and load the most suitable views through models. By using the default MVC structure to build a website or application you could both save time and increase quality.

2. Include JavaScript, CSS, & third-party libraries

A significant portion of CodeIgniter website development services depends on an array of libraries. Using JavaScript and CSS libraries, you could quickly develop user experience-rich websites and apps. For instance, JavaScript MVC and jQuery allow you to incorporate advanced features.

3. Customize caching for web development

CodeIgniter developers often use object-relational mapping (ORM) libraries. The framework offers a host of ORM, and third-party libraries integrated with caching support. They can significantly boost your custom web development project.

4. Render views using template engines 

You could create captivating views using various templates from the CodeIgniter framework. Besides, CodeIgniter also offers third-party template engines according to your specific requirements. Web developers can also use easy integration of personalized template engines to create intelligent views.

5. Validate inputs 

To ensure the desired code quality and performance, you need to validate all inputs to the database. Inputs that are thoroughly examined help you avoid bugs that later may create a great deal of trouble. Additionally, validation also enables you to prevent SQL injections which further improves data management. If you hire CodeIgniter developers for making a custom site, do ask them to follow these steps.

6. Incorporate SEO-friendly URLs

If you’re building a website, its visibility is the most crucial parameter for success. And that site needs search engine optimization (SEO). URLs play one of the most critical roles when it comes to ensuring the desired SEO. That is why you need to use URLs that enhance the website’s rank on search engines like Google. Practices like removing “index.php” URLs are proven ways to improve SEO.

7. Configure directory & handle errors 

All things said and done, now you need to store the configuration files under the config directory. It’s because files located outside the config directory may disrupt the execution of a broad range of application functions. That means such disruption may even lead to major glitches and runtime errors, among many other potential issues.

Conclusion 

Web development frameworks like CodeIgniter will likely evolve even more dramatically in the coming years. But for the best practices, we discussed here will be relevant. If you’re a business owner planning to hire CodeIgniter developers, knowing these steps gives you crucial advantages. From efficiency using the MVC architecture to examining code and implementing SEO, these best practices could significantly boost your digital presence.