Events

CodeIgniter’s Events feature provides a means to tap into and modify the inner workings of the framework without hacking core files. When CodeIgniter runs, it follows a specific execution process. There may be instances, however, when you’d like to cause some action to take place at a particular stage in the execution process. For example, you might want to run a script right before your controllers get loaded, or right after, or you might want to trigger one of your own scripts in some other location.

Events work on a publish/subscribe pattern, where an event is triggered at some point during the script execution. Other scripts can “subscribe” to that event by registering with the Events class to let it know they want to perform an action when that event is triggered.

Enabling Events

Events are always enabled, and are available globally.

Defining an Event

Most events are defined within the app/Config/Events.php file. You can subscribe an action to an event with the Events class’s on() method. The first parameter is the name of the event to subscribe to. The second parameter is a callable that will be run when that event is triggered:

<?php

use CodeIgniter\Events\Events;

Events::on('pre_system', ['MyClass', 'myFunction']);

In this example, whenever the pre_system event is executed, an instance of MyClass is created and the myFunction() method is run. Note that the second parameter can be any form of callable that PHP recognizes:

<?php

use CodeIgniter\Events\Events;

// Call a standalone function
Events::on('pre_system', 'some_function');

// Call on an instance method
$user = new \App\Libraries\User();
Events::on('pre_system', [$user, 'someMethod']);

// Call on a static method
Events::on('pre_system', 'SomeClass::someMethod');

// Use a Closure
Events::on('pre_system', static function (...$params) {
    // ...
});

Setting Priorities

Since multiple methods can be subscribed to a single event, you will need a way to define in what order those methods are called. You can do this by passing a priority value as the third parameter of the on() method. Lower values are executed first, with a value of 1 having the highest priority, and there being no limit on the lower values:

<?php

use CodeIgniter\Events\Events;

Events::on('post_controller_constructor', 'some_function', 25);

Any subscribers with the same priority will be executed in the order they were defined.

Since v4.2.0, three class constants are defined for your use, that set some helpful ranges on the values. You are not required to use these but you might find they aid readability:

<?php

use CodeIgniter\Events\Events;

Events::PRIORITY_LOW;    // 200
Events::PRIORITY_NORMAL; // 100
Events::PRIORITY_HIGH;   // 10

Important

The constants EVENT_PRIORITY_LOW, EVENT_PRIORITY_NORMAL and EVENT_PRIORITY_HIGH are deprecated, and the definitions are moved to app/Config/Constants.php. These will be removed in future releases.

Once sorted, all subscribers are executed in order. If any subscriber returns a boolean false value, then execution of the subscribers will stop.

Publishing your own Events

The Events library makes it simple for you to create events in your own code, also. To use this feature, you would simply need to call the trigger() method on the Events class with the name of the event:

<?php

\CodeIgniter\Events\Events::trigger('some_event');

You can pass any number of arguments to the subscribers by adding them as additional parameters. Subscribers will be given the arguments in the same order as defined:

<?php

use CodeIgniter\Events\Events;

Events::trigger('some_events', $foo, $bar, $baz);

Events::on('some_event', static function ($foo, $bar, $baz) {
    // ...
});

Simulating Events

During testing, you might not want the events to actually fire, as sending out hundreds of emails a day is both slow and counter-productive. You can tell the Events class to only simulate running the events with the simulate() method. When true, all events will be skipped over during the trigger method. Everything else will work as normal, though.

<?php

use CodeIgniter\Events\Events;

Events::simulate(true);

You can stop simulation by passing false:

<?php

use CodeIgniter\Events\Events;

Events::simulate(false);

Event Points

For Web Apps

The following is a list of available event points for web applications that are invoked by public/index.php:

  • pre_system Called early during system execution. The URI, Request, and Response have been instantiated, but page cache checking, routing, and execution of “before” controller filters have not yet occurred.

  • post_controller_constructor Called immediately after your controller is instantiated, but prior to any method calls happening.

  • post_system Called right before the final rendered page is sent to the browser, at the end of system execution, after the execution of “after” controller filters.

For CLI Apps

The following is a list of available event points for Spark Commands:

  • pre_command Called right before the command code execution.

  • post_command Called right after the command code execution.

Others

The following is a list of event points available for each of the libraries:

  • email Called after an email sent successfully from CodeIgniter\Email\Email. Receives an array of the Email class’s properties as a parameter.

  • DBQuery Called after a database query whether successful or not. Receives the Query object.

  • migrate Called after a successful migration call to latest() or regress(). Receives the current properties of MigrationRunner as well as the name of the method.