Where to put plain object classes?

I know what it does. I just don't understand your concern. If you're afraid to use this class, then don't. CI doesn't force you to use anything. But I don't see any good reason not to. Can you give an example where it would cause problems?

I don't expect I will use CI_Model, mostly because it might get confusing if I wanted to give my own model class a property with any of these names:

Code:

benchmark
hooks
config
log
utf8
uri
router
output
security
input
lang
load
session
db

All of these properties are defined by the CodeIgniter object and if you define a trivial class with no properties that extends CI_Model, it looks like that trivial object has all of those properties. I can see how this might be handy, but This just seems weird to me:

Code:

class Test_model extends CI_Model {
    public function __construct() {
        var_dump($this->lang); // yields object(CI_Lang)#11 (2) { ["language"]=> array(0) { } ["is_loaded"]=> array(0) { } }
    }
}

I can see how it might be convenient to have access to the entire CI environment within one's models, but I believe it reduces the modularity of one's code to depend on this elaborate object automatically being instantiated whenever I need a model. If I did actually want such a complex object attached automatically to every model I create, I would defintely want it at least to have its own property within my model class (e.g., $this->ci->lang) instead of automagically inserting its own 14 properties into every model I have.

I have also noticed that creating a class that extends CI_Model like this:

PHP Code:

class Test_model extends CI_Model {
    public function __construct() {
        die("Here i am!");
    }
} 


will mean you have to include/require system/core/Model.php or you get this error:

Code:

Fatal error: Class 'CI_Model' not found in /var/www/erep-v4/application/models/Test_model.php on line 2