No in depth analysis here of two very popular MVC frameworks, Code Igniter vs Zend Framework. If you wan’t in depth analysis, you can go to one of the thousands of other blogs, all with the same content, pros and cons, split down the middle on which framework is better. I’m only going to give you my opinion and experience.
The down right better MVC is code igniter, and here’s why.
It’s way easier and quicker to pickup. I spent about less then a day and with in a couple of days I had written CRUD models for a complex database, and some content scrapers all with in CI. I spent a day going through Zend’s two tutorials, and then a few days trying to recreate them to create and read something from a database. My guess this is by design, Zend want’s you to pay in the thousands of dollars for their training.
You don’t have to use Composer. I’m not sure why it bugs me but it does, I can clone a git repo with out need to install additional tools.
Code Igniter has better documentation and their is more support online. Good luck trying to find even an outline of the complex module architecture in the documentation, not to mention there UI sucks.
Code Igniter is light weight. Bloat sucks.
So my advice is choose code igniter, you’ll be developing quicker, and can bring new team members up to speed quicker.
