Question

I am developing a stats site in Codeigniter locally. I have a url like localhost/sitename/player/show_profile/PlayerName

I currently have the following:

<?php if ( ! defined('BASEPATH')) exit('No direct script access allowed');

class Player extends CI_Controller
{

  public function __construct()
  {
    parent::__construct();
    $this->load->model('player_model');
    $player_name = $this->uri->segment(3);
  }


  public function index()
  {
        echo "index";
  }

  public function show_profile($player_name)

  {

        $data['player_stats'] = $this->player_model->get_stats( $player_name );
        $this->load->view('player/player_stats', $data);
  }

}

?>

This works, but my question is regarding the $player_name variable. I have $player_name = $this->uri->segment(3); in the __construct so it’s available to all of the class methods. Is this the way I should be doing it?

Is this safe?

Answer 1

Fist of all, there is no point in assigning the variable in the constructor because it’s going to get overwritten. When you pass CI a url like localhost/sitename/player/show_profile/PlayerName, anything passed the method (i.e. PlayerName) get’s set as the parameters. Therefore, your variable in

public function show_profile($player_name){

is already set when you get to your method code.

Secondly, I agree with Peter’s:

protected $player_name;

for making it globally accessible in the controller. BUT, I don’t agree with setting it in the constructor. If you have another method in this controller that passes a variable in that spot, you’re going to get the wrong data in there. Set it in the method you called:

public function show_profile($player_name){

    $this->player_name = $player_name;

    $data['player_stats'] = $this->player_model->get_stats( $player_name );
    $this->load->view('player/player_stats', $data);
}