What is the second parameter doing in model("pagemodel", 'pages')

Question

I have following model and controller. And database table pages has id, title, content and slug.

Q1. Why does the line in controller,

$this->load->model("pagemodel", 'pages'); // Load the page model,

have 'pages'?

Is it naming "pagemodel" as pages?

And I see a line,

$page_data = $this->pages->fetch($page_slug); // Pull the page data from the database

using pages.

Model code

<?php

class Pagemodel extends Model 
{

    /** 
    * Constructor
    */
    function Pagemodel()
    {
     parent::Model();
    }

    /** 
    * Return an array of pages — used in the manage view
    *
    * @access public
    * @return array
    */
    function pages()
    {
     $query = $this->db->query("SELECT * FROM `pages` ORDER BY `id` ASC");
     return $query->result_array();
    }

    /** 
    * Return a list of a single page — used when editing a page
    *
    * @access public
    * @param integer
    * @return array
    */
    function page($id)
    {
     $query = $this->db->query("SELECT * FROM `pages` WHERE `id` = '$id' LIMIT 1");
     return $query->result_array();
    }

    /** 
    * Return an array of a page — used in the front end
    *
    * @access public
    * @param string
    * @return array
    */
    function fetch($slug)
    {
     $query = $this->db->query("SELECT * FROM `pages` WHERE `slug` = '$slug'");
     return $query->result_array();
    }

    /** 
    * Add a record to the database
    *
    * @access public
    * @param array
    */
    function add($data)
    {
     $this->db->query("INSERT INTO `pages` (`title`, `content`, `slug`) VALUES (".$this->db->$data['title'].", ".$this->db->$data['content'].", ".$this->db->escape($data['slug']).")");
    }

    /** 
    * Update a record in the database
    *
    * @access public
    * @param integer
    * @param array
    */
    function edit($id, $data)
    {
     $this->db->query("UPDATE `pages` SET `title` = ".$this->db->escape($data['title']).", `content` = ".$this->db->escape($data['content']).", `slug` = ".$this->db->escape($data['slug'])." WHERE `id` = '$id'");
    }

    /** 
    * Remove a record from the database
    *
    * @access public
    * @param integer
    */
    function delete($id)
    {
     $this->db->query("DELETE FROM `pages` WHERE `id` = '$id'");
    }

}

?>

Controller code

<?php

class Page extends Application
{

    function Page()
    {
     parent::Application();
     $this->load->model("pagemodel", 'pages'); // Load the page model
    }

    function _view($page, $page_data)
    {
     $meta = array (
     'meta_title' => 'title here',
     'meta_keywords' => 'keywords here',
     'meta_description' => 'description here',
     'meta_robots' => 'all',
     'extra_headers' => '
     <script language="javascript" type="text/javascript" src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.3.0/jquery.min.js"&gt;&lt;/script&gt;

     '
     );

     $data = array();
     // add any data

     // merge meta and data
     $data = array_merge($data,$meta);

     // load view with data
     $this->load->view('header', $data);


     $this->load->view($page, $page_data);
     $this->load->view('footer');
    }

    function index()
    {
     $page_slug = $this->uri->segment('2'); // Grab the URI segment

     if($page_slug === FALSE)
     {
      $page_slug = 'home'; //Change home if you change the name in the back-end
     }

     $page_data = $this->pages->fetch($page_slug); // Pull the page data from the database

     if($page_data === FALSE)
     {
      show_404(); // Show a 404 if no page exists
     }
     else
     {
      $this->_view('index', $page_data[0]);
     }
    }




}

?>

Answer 1

You are probably right, try renaming 'pages' and I bet it's not available anymore by calling $this->pages in your controller code.

Answer 2

From system/libraries/Loader.php

/**
* Model Loader
*
* This function lets users load and instantiate models.
*
* @access   public
* @param    string the name of the class
* @param    string name for the model
* @param    bool database connection
* @return   void
*/  
function model($model, $name = '', $db_conn = FALSE)
{
    ...

So yes, the second parameter is just setting a 'friendly' name for the model, and is not needed. It adds a layer of confusion in my opinion.