I so something similar but a bit more complex to allow blocking, but in essence these are all simplistic versions of very well thought out and developed/matured template systems that others have already done. (Personally I still use my own because I can alter it easily for each sites requirements).
My point is that for a beginner, having a well documented, sophisticated, out of the box solution might be beneficial and probably quite attractive to people considering CI for the first time. I recall struggling with views, when simple views were not enough, or became cumbersome, and struggling to implement some of the existing frameworks.
The only negatives I can see is the backlash from people assuming you have to use an out of the box solution that they do not like, or the fact that questions might arise that have nothing to do with CI but about whatever the chosen templating system is. I just don't think that time spent developing anything in-house to do what has already been done very powerfully (and in all honesty is a bit of a side avenue for a framework to go down) is the best use of the core teams time.
On a side note, it would be quite cool as well to have an out of the box authentication and authorization system, even though the same arguments against can be raised, I strongly believe that an out of the box optional implementation of both authentication and templating would make CI far more attractive to newcomers. There are already great authentication libraries for CI, and templating libraries, I believe it would be good for CI if the CI team spent a minimal amount of time choosing, polishing and including some of those as part of the default download.
Just to be clear, as much as control freaks like me like to do everything myself, it seems that these two things are two things most people need and expect from their framework. Personally I see them as tools to implement on a framework, much as I do the helpers in general, and not really part of a pure framework, but I am sure CI would increase it's audience if these were included by default.
Just my two pennies on the subject, and as always, humbly yours,
Paul.
