Question

I am going to start using codeigniter, but since it only offers to cache everything or nothing (which would not work, because I have logins, and other areas which cannot be cached) I was wondering whether it is a good idea to use Smarty.

The only concern I have in this question is speed. (No yes/no smarty general question.)

My Question:
CodeIgniter with some db queries (blog, loading data for pages from the database, etc.)

vs.

CodeIgniter + same db + smarty + partial caching (and of course if smarty->is_cached(.tpl) do not do any db requests)

What is fast, what should I use. Are there any smarty-benchmarks I did not see? Starting at how many db request, would you say, smarty improves performance noticeable considering you have to also load the smarty library?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Smarty or any template system is another layer of complexity. It comes with overload not with performance increase, even when cached. Its advantages are others, like easiness to develop with.