News and statistics in the left column

[eluser]sl3dg3hamm3r[/eluser]
I wouldn't mess around too much with globals. Stick to class-members, make data a member:

Code:

class SiteController extends Controller {
    var $_container;
    protected var $data;  // Not sure if 'protected' workes if PHP < 5, if not leave it away


    function SiteController() {
        // Call parent constructor
        parent::Controller();

        $this->data['news'] = $this->db->get('news');
        echo $this->data['news']->num_rows(); // This returns 2 as it should
    }
}

In the child class, you also need to write $this->data...

Not tested, but should work like that...