Why use CodeIgniter over Laravel for new projects?

[eluser]cpassas[/eluser]
Let me first say I like CodeIgniter a lot and have been using it a few years. I'm starting a new project and have been following CodeIgniter 3 as a potential choice. While doing that Laravel 3/4 comes up a lot as a strong option.

It seems like a lot of php developers (Many former CodeIgniter) are moving to Laravel. What I haven't seen is much Pro-CodeIgniter talk about why stick with CodeIgniter. I'm not referring to existing projects, I only mean if your starting something new why would use CI over Laravel.

Thank in advance for your feedback.

[eluser]Aken[/eluser]
Same answer as every other topic related to this: CI and Laravel are just different tools. Use the one that best suits you and/or the project.

[eluser]cpassas[/eluser]
[quote author="Aken" date="1358744696"]Same answer as every other topic related to this: CI and Laravel are just different tools. Use the one that best suits you and/or the project.[/quote]

They are different php frameworks to help speed site development.

I was hoping for more of a CodeIgniter is better at X and Laravel is better at Y type of response.

Example 1: You would use CodeIgniter because you need php 5.2 support.

Example 2: Laravel has a better ORM. (Not saying its true, just an example)

I could make a large list of other developers claims as to what is better in Laravel. I just haven't seen much of the same related to CodeIgniter.

[eluser]Aken[/eluser]
That's because Laravel is the hot new piece of ass in the PHP community. People will always talk about the new and exciting thing. You don't see anyone asking the same about Cake, Fuel, Symfony, etc. CI has the same principals and benefits that it has always had. I don't see why it should continually defend itself against Laravel, or anything for that matter.

Besides, this debate is completely speculative and opinion-based. Just because Laravel is better for one person doesn't mean it's better for another. Same can be said for any framework.

I like Laravel and am continuing to learn it, so this is hardly a post condemning it. We're all just a little tired of CI being put down in comparison.

[eluser]cpassas[/eluser]
I'm not putting it down at all, I'm still using it and probably will for my next project. I'm also learning Laravel because I find it interesting to see how the new features of PHP are being used.

Are there any Reactor members that blog about CodeIgniter currently? The only 2 I've found both have moved on from the project. EllisLab seems pretty quiet unless they are announcing a version release.

[eluser]Aken[/eluser]
You're not putting it down, no. Just a blanket statement about the general sentiment of a lot of these topics, which all pretty much have the same response.

I'm not even sure who's on the reactor team anymore -- only a couple people are active in responding to issues and pull requests. If they blog about it, I'm unaware.

[eluser]Jubair[/eluser]
I personally think cpassas had a legitimate question here.. what are the strengths and weaknesses of each in comparison to each other.
[quote author="Aken" date="1358744696"]Same answer as every other topic related to this: CI and Laravel are just different tools. Use the one that best suits you and/or the project.[/quote]
Yes. Different tools. you then said, "Use the one that best suits you and/or the project." which brings us back to cpassas' original question. Perhaps rephrased by asking: What is each best suited for as a developer and as a project, generally speaking and yes opinion, as is always the case in such comparisons.

We (people like cpassas, my self, and many others) are looking for folks' opinions here. Their experiences of the two and what they like/dislike about each.

[eluser]cpassas[/eluser]
Jubair thank you for the supporting statements you've made.

For me personally I've been building my new project using the dev build of CI 3.0. Since I asked for people's opinions I'll give mine as to why I made this choice.

Why I didn't pick Laravel.

1.
Laravel has been updated from version 1 to now 4beta3 all in about 2 years. Also until recently it was all the work of one person. This was concerning to me because I really prefer to keep my code/framework current but I can't be rewriting my code every 6 months to keep current. I have heard Laravel is suppose to slow development some after 4.0 release.

2.
I'm not a big fan of the framework being built on top of many other frameworks pieces. I think its a really good idea to make modular code that can be reused but I prefer a framework be one thing instead of many things glued together.

3.
To me it seems like CodeIgniter is a lighter looser framework. I prefer this because I like to do things a certain way without having to many framework rules force decisions on me.


Reason's I'm concerned about CodeIgniter

1.
EllisLab is very bad about posting updates about the framework. They don't give progress reports or share any information. You can watch the github project to see whats happening (I have been a lot) but thats not the whole picture. On github mostly 1 developer @Narfbg is doing all the pull request and thats it. Also there is no way to know when will it be completed? There isn't a feature list you can look at to see if it's almost done. For example Ellis released CI 2.1 I think in 2011 and said version 3 would support HMVC but 3.0 won't have HMVC. I found in the github issue's its moved to version 4.0.

2. A view of the very vocal Reactor developers have switched from CI to Laravel. First this concerns me they believe Laravel is worth switching to maybe I should to?. Secondly there isn't anyone else left to blog or post any updates on the framework or it's direction. In case anyone is wondering I'm referring to Phil and Eric as the Reactor members that have moved away from CI. (Thank you to you both for your post CI contributions not just code but keeping the community up to date)

3.
I'm a little worried I might build my project on version 3.0 and then nothing will be released after 3.0. PHP is changing a lot right now with all the new features being added to the language and it seem's CI is falling behind quickly. It would really help if EllisLab updated the community every few months about CI and the roadmap they have in mind.

4.
The license of CI isn't the best. The whole OSL(3.0) thing I still find confusing. I've tried to read it myself but its lawyer talk and not extremely clear. If you really want to help us out make it MIT or Apache?


What I'd like to see happen.

1. EllisLab Post regular updates about CI. Every 3 months 2 paragraphs would be great.
2. Some public way for us to see the progress of a release. 3.0 might release in 2 days or 6 months. I don't see how we're suppose to know when it's done or almost done?
3. Layout the long term strategy so we know what direction CI is heading. Many CI users need to make business decisions and we don't have a lot to go on except that CI has been around a long time and what we see right now.
4. Probably not the biggest problem but a better open source license might make us feel safter choosing CI.

This is all my opinion I'm sure I'm not correct about some things. I'd love to hear what others think about these issue's in general.

[eluser]Jubair[/eluser]
See.. that kind of response is what we should have gotten from the start of this thread! thanks for taking the time cpassas!

I do a LOT of EE2 and CT2 development so as a result, I use CI a lot. I did start another pet project on Laravel though to get a better understanding of it. I have to say, it is refreshing that's for sure. But I will continue to use CI because of EE2 and CT2, but I have a feeling that with 100% custom solutions, I might be leaning toward Laravel on many of them simply because it's taking advantage of the current best practices and features from PHP5.3.

I just hope EllisLab makes a serious effort to update CI along side EE2 to take full advantage of the latest features in PHP5.3. It's not about CI competing with the next hot framework out there. it's about CI staying in the game. back in the day, when CI came out it was all the rage for good reason, it was using best practices for the time and because other frameworks didn't keep up, CI gained traction. now the same is happening with Laravel. But, CI, can keep up if leadership over at EllisLabs decided to take on the task.

[eluser]cpassas[/eluser]
I don't even mind if CI moves slower then a new framework, I'd expect it too because you don't want to abandon all your current developers by rewriting to often.

I've started a couple toy projects in Laravel and I love the syntax of the framework and it's use of modern php.

Right now I'm not a big fan of Laravel pushing ORM so much. I am very comfortable writing SQL and I like knowing I'm writing the most efficient SQL possible rather then allowing a framework to auto generate it for me.

Also Laravel has good documentation but its still only half as good as CodeIgniter documentation. I'd prefer to not have to look up so many little things by digging into the source code. I know I can learn more that way but I don't always have the time to look in code for the answer to every little thing.

If EllisLab isn't interested in CI anymore I think it would be better if they switch to MIT license and let the Reactor team completely take over the project.

I did email EllisLab about 3 weeks ago and they said they have been busy with updating their site and other projects and would be pushing out CI 3.0 soon.