@Reinis answer probably hit the spot correctly for older versions of CI less than 2.0 however alot has changed since then, so I thought I'd answer this question with an up to date method of what I've done.
Most of it is similar to @Reinis method and also described here:http://codeigniter.com/wiki/MY_Controller_-_how_to_extend_the_CI_Controller
However here are the updates ive done:
Step 1: Create a MY_Controller.php file and store it in /application/core
Step 2: In your MY_Controller.php file put in the following contents:
<?php if ( ! defined('BASEPATH')) exit('No direct script access allowed');
class MY_Controller extends CI_Controller {
function __construct()
{
parent::__construct();
}
function _output($content)
{
// Load the base template with output content available as $content
$data['content'] = &$content;
echo($this->load->view('base', $data, true));
}
}
Step 3: Create a sample controller to base off of MY_Controller.php, in this case I will create a welcome.php controller inside of application/controllers/ with the following content:
<?php if ( ! defined('BASEPATH')) exit('No direct script access allowed');
class Welcome extends MY_Controller {
function __construct()
{
parent::__construct();
}
public function index()
{
$this->load->view('welcome_message');
}
}
Once you have these controllers set, do the following:
Step 4: Create a base view inside of /application/views and name the file base.php, the content of the file should be similar to this:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<!--[if IE 7 ]><html lang="en" class="ie7"><![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 8 ]><html lang="en" class="ie8"><![endif]-->
<!--[if gt IE 8]><!--><html lang="en"><!--<![endif]-->
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8" />
<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge,chrome=1" />
<title></title>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="<?php echo base_url(); ?>stylesheets/reset.css" media="screen" />
</head>
<body>
<div id="section_main">
<div id="content">
<?php echo $content; ?>
</div>
</div>
<?php $this->load->view('shared/scripts.php'); ?>
</div>
</body>
</html>
Step 5: Create another view in /application/views and name this view welcome_message.php, the content of this file will be:
<h1>Welcome</h1>
Once, all this is complete, you should see the following output:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<!--[if IE 7 ]><html lang="en" class="ie7"><![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 8 ]><html lang="en" class="ie8"><![endif]-->
<!--[if gt IE 8]><!--><html lang="en"><!--<![endif]-->
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8" />
<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge,chrome=1" />
<title></title>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="http://somedomain.local/stylesheets/reset.css" media="screen" />
</head>
<body>
<!-- BEGIN: section_main -->
<div id="section_main">
<div id="content">
<h1>Welcome</h1>
</div>
</div>
<!-- END: section_main -->
<script src="/path/to/js.js"></script>
</div>
</body>
</html>
As you can see <h1>Welcome</h1> was put into the base template.
Resources:
Hope this helps anyone else coming across this technique.
