I've been reading up on DDD a little bit, and I am confused how this would fit in when using an ORM like NHibernate.
Right now I have a .NET MVC application with fairly "fat" controllers, and I'm trying to figure out how best to fix that. Moving this business logic into the model layer would be the best way to do this, but I am unsure how one would do that.
My application is set up so that NHibernate's session is managed by an HttpModule (gets session / transaction out of my way), which is used by repositories that return the entity objects (Think S#arp arch... turns out a really duplicated a lot of their functionality in this). These repositories are used by DataServices, which right now are just wrappers around the Repositories (one-to-one mapping between them, e.g. UserDataService takes a UserRepository, or actually a Repository). These DataServices right now only ensure that data annotations decorating the entity classes are checked when saving / updating.
In this way, my entities are really just data objects, but do not contain any real logic. While I could put some things in the entity classes (e.g. an "Approve" method), when that action needs to do something like sending an e-mail, or touching other non-related objects, or, for instance, checking to see if there are any users that have the same e-mail before approving, etc., then the entity would need access to other repositories, etc. Injecting these with an IoC wouldn't work with NHibernate, so you'd have to use a factory pattern I'm assuming to get these. I don't see how you would mock those in tests though.
So the next most logical way to do it, I would think, would be to essentially have a service per controller, and extract all of the work being done in the controller currently into methods in each service. I would think that this is breaking with the DDD idea though, as the logic is now no longer contained in the actual model objects.
The other way of looking at that I guess is that each of those services forms a single model with the data object that it works against (Separation of data storage fields and the logic that operates on it), but I just wanted to see what others are doing to solve the "fat controller" issue with DDD while using an ORM like NHibernate that works by returning populated data objects, and the repository model.
Updated
I guess my problem is how I'm looking at this: NHibernate seems to put business objects (entities) at the bottom of the stack, which repositories then act on. The repositories are used by services which may use multiple repositories and other services (email, file access) to do things. I.e: App > Services > Repositories > Business Objects
The pure DDD approach I'm reading about seems to reflect an Active Record bias, where the CRUD functions exist in the business objects (This I call User.Delete directly instead of Repository.Delete from a service), and the actual business object handles the logic of things that need to be done in this instance (Like emailing the user, and deleting files belonging to the user, etc.). I.e. App > (Services) > Business Objects > Repositories
With NHibernate, it seems I would be better off using the first approach given the way NHibernate functions, and I am looking for confirmation on my logic. Or if I'm just confused, some clarification on how this layered approach is supposed to work. My understanding is that if I have an "Approve" method that updates the User model, persists it, and lets say, emails a few people, that this method should go on the User entity object, but to allow for proper IoC so I can inject the messagingService, I need to do this in my service layer instead of on the User object.
From a "multiple UI" point of view this makes sense, as the logic to do things is taken out of my UI layer (MVC), and put into these services... but I'm essentially just factoring the logic out to another class instead of doing it directly in the controller, and if I am not ever going to have any other UI's involved, then I've just traded a "fat controller" for a "fat service", since the service is essentially going to encapsulate a method per controller action to do it's work.
DDD does not have an Active Record slant. Delete is not a method that should be on an Entity (like User) in DDD.
NHibernate does support a DDD approach very well, because of how completely divorced it remains from your entity classes.
when that action needs to do something
like sending an e-mail, or touching
other non-related objects
One piece of the puzzle it seems you are missing is Domain Events. A domain entity shouldn't send an email directly. It should raise an event in the Domain that some significant event has happened. Implement a class whose purpose is to send the email when the event occurs, and register it to listen for the Domain Event.
or, for instance, checking to see if
there are any users that have the same
e-mail before approving
This should probably be checked before submitting the call to "approve," rather than in the function that does the approving. Push the decision up a level in calling code.
So the next most logical way to do it,
I would think, would be to essentially
have a service per controller
This can work, if it's done with the understanding that the service is an entry point for the client. The service's purpose here is to take in parameters in a DTO from the front end/client and translate that into method calls against an entity in order to perform the desired funcitonality.
The only limitations NHibernate creates for classes is all methods/properties must be virtual and a class must have a default constructor (can be internal or protected). Otherwise, it does not [edit] interfere with object structure and can map to pretty complex models.
The short answer to you question is yes, in fact, I find NHibernate enhances DDD - you can focus on developing (and altering) your domain model with a code first approach, then easily retro-fit persistence later using NHibernate.
As you build out your domain model following DDD, I would expect that much of the business logic that's found you way into you MVC controllers should probably reside in your domain objects. In my first attempt at using ASP.NET MVC I quickly found myself in the same position as yourself - fat controllers and an anemic domain model.
To avoid this, I'm now following the approach of keeping a rich domain model that implements the business logic and using MVC's model as essentially simple data objects used by my views. This simplifies my controllers - they interact with my domain model and provide simple data objects (from the MVC model) to the views.
Updated
The pure DDD approach I'm reading about seems to reflect an Active Record bias...
To me the active record pattern means entities are aware of their persistance mechanism and an entity maps directly to a database table record. This is one way of using NHibernate e.g. see Castle Active Record, however, I find this pollutes domain enitities with knowledge of their persistence mechanism. Instead, typically, I'll have a repository per aggregate root in my domain model which implements an abstract repository. The abstract repository provides basic CRUD methods such as:
public IList<TEntity> GetAll()
public TEntity GetById(int id)
public void SaveOrUpdate(TEntity entity)
public void Delete(TEntity entity)
.. which my concrete repositories can supplement/extend.
See this post on The NHibernate FAQ which I've based a lot of my stuff on. Also remember, NHibernate (depending on how you set up your mappings) will allow you to de-persist a complete object graph, i.e. your aggregate root plus all the objects hanging off it and once you've finished working with it, can cascade saves through you entire object graph, this certainly isn't active record.
...since the service is essentially going to encapsulate a method per controller action to do it's work...
I still think you should consider what functionality that you currently have in your controllers should, more logically, be implemented within your domain objects. e.g. in your approval example, I think it would be sensible for an entity to expose an approve method which does whatever it needs to do to within the entity and if, as in your example, needs to send emails, delegate this to a service. Services should be reserved for cross-cutting concerns. Then, once you've finished working with your domain objects, pass them back to your repository to persist changes.
A couple of books I've found useful on these topics are:
Domain-Driven Design by Eric Evans
Applying Domain-Driven Design and Patterns by Jimmy Nilsson
Related
I'm aware that in model-view-controller, the Model is the class part.
If I have a User class and instantiate an object, the object must refer to a single user from the database.
So I'll have the CRUD methods on the user, for that specific user.
But if I need a function to run a SELECT * FROM Users, should I create a function within the User class? Or a function in a helper file? Or in the controller? Where should it go, in order to respect the MVC pattern?
I mean, it makes no sense to instantiate a User object just to run a function to display the Users table.
I'm not sure if this will raise "primarily opinion based" flags. I just don't know where those functions should go. If you guys consider the question worth closing, it's ok. But tell me in the comments in which stack community I should ask this.
Back up a bit. Let's go foundational for a moment.
In the MVC pattern
The model is your state (in simple terms), meaning a representation of the data important to the business functionality you are working with
The view is a way of presenting the state to the user (NOTE user here could be another system, as you can use MVC patterns for service endpoints)
The controller ensures the model gets to the view and back out of the view
In a system designed with good separation of state, business functions are not present in the model, the view or the controller. You segregate business functionality into its own class library. Why? You never know when the application will require a mobile (native, not web) implementation or a desktop implementation or maybe even become part of a windows service.
As for getting at data, proper separation of concerns states the data access is separate not only from the model, view and controller, but also from the business functionality. This is why DALs are created.
Before going on, let's go to your questions.
should I create a function within the User class? This is an "active record" pattern, which is largely deprecated today, as it closely couples behavior and state. I am sure there are still some instances where it applies, but I would not use it.
Or a function in a helper file? Better option, as you can separate it out. But I am not fond of "everything in a single project" approach, personally.
Or in the controller? Never, despite Scott Gu's first MVC examples where he put LINQ to SQL (another groan?) in the controller.
Where should it go, in order to respect the MVC pattern?
Here is my suggestion:
Create a DAL project to access the data. One possible pattern that works nicely here is the repository pattern. If you utilize the same data type for your keys in all/most tables, you can create a generic repository and then derive individual versions for specific data. Okay, so this one is really old, but looking over it, it still has the high level concepts (https://gregorybeamer.wordpress.com/2010/08/10/generics-on-the-data-access-layer)
Create a core project for the business logic, if needed. I do this every time, as it allows me to test the ideas on the DAL through unit tests. Yes, I can test directly in the MVC project (and do), but I like a clean separation as you rarely find 0% business rules in a solution.
Have the core pull the data from the DAL project and the MVC project use the core project. Nice flow. Easy to unit test. etc.
If you want this in a single project, then separate out the bits into different folders so you can make individual projects, if needed, in the future.
For the love of all things good and holy, don't use the repository pattern. #GregoryABeamer has a great answer in all respects, except recommending you create repository instances to access your entities. Your ORM (most likely Entity Framework) covers this, and completely replaces the concepts of repositories and unit of work.
Simply, if you need something from your database, hit your ORM directly in your controller. If you prefer, you can still add a level of abstraction to hide the use of the ORM itself, such that you could more easily switch out the data access with another ORM, Web Api, etc. Just don't do a traditional unit of work with tens or hundreds of repository instances. If you're interested, you can read a series of posts I wrote about that on my blog. I use the term "repository" with my approach, but mostly just to contrast with the typical "generic" repository approach you find scattered all over the interwebs.
I'd use some kind of 'Repository' layer. Then, my controller calls the UserRepository GetAll method and sends the data to View layer.
I'd like to create a good app in ASP.NET MVC 5 using EF 6 Code first concept. I want it to be well-designed i.e. having generally speaking: Presentation, Logic and Data layers separated. I want it to be testable :)
Here's my idea and some issues related with creating application
Presentation layer: It's my whole MVC - view models(not models), views, controllers
I believe that's validation should be done somewhere else (in my opinion - it's a part of business logic) but it's quite convenient to use attributes from the DataAnnotations namespace in ViewModelds and check validation in controller.
Logic layer: Services - classes with their interfaces to rule business logic.
I put there functions like: AddNewPerson(PersonViewModel Person), SendMessageToPerson(...).
They will use DB context to make their actions (there's a chance that not all of them will be relying on context). There's a direct connection between service and db - I mean the service class have reference do context.
Where should I do mapping between ViewModel and Model? I've heard that service is a bad place for it - so maybe in controllers. I've heard that service should do the work related with db exclusively.
Is it right? Is my picture of service layer is good?
Data layer: I've read about Repository and UoW patterns a lot. There're some articles which suggest that EF6 implements these two things. I don't want to create extra code if there's no need for such a behavior. The question is: am i right to assume that i don't need them?
Here's my flow:
View<->Controllers(using ViewModels)<->Services(using Models)<->DB.
**I'm gonna use DI in my project.
What do you think about my project structure?
There is no reason to use a Unit of Work pattern with Entity Framework if you have no need to create a generic data access mechanism. You would only do this if you were:
using a data access technology that did not natively support a Unit of work pattern (EF does)
Wanted to be able to swap out data providers sometime in the future.. however, this is not as easy as it might seem as it's very hard NOT to introduce dependencies on specific data technologies even when using an Unit of Work (maybe even BECAUSE you are)... or
You need to have a way of unifying disparate data sources into an atomic transaction.
If none of those are the case, you most likely don't need a custom Unit of Work. A Repository, on the other hand can be useful... but with EF6 many of the benefits of a Repository are also available since EF6 provides mocking interfaces for testing. Regardless, stay away from a generic repository unless it's simply an implementation detail of your concrete repositories. Exposing generic repositories to your other layers is a huge abstraction leak...
I always use a Repository/Service/Façade pattern though to create a separation between my data and business (and UI and business for that matter) layers. It provides a convenient way to mock without having to mock your data access itself and it decouples your logic from the specific that are introduced by the Linq layer used by EF (Linq is relatively generic, but there are things that are specific to EF), a façade/repository/server interface decouples that).
In general, you're on the right path... However, let me point out that using Data Attributes on your view models is a good thing. This centralizes your validation on your model, rather than making you put validation logic all over the place.
You're correct that you need validation in your business logic as well, but your mistake is the assumption that you should only have it on the business logic. You need validation at all layers of your application.. And in particular, your UI validation may have different requirements than your business logic validation.
For instance, you may implement creating a new account as a multi-step wizard in your UI, this would require different validation than your business layer because each step has only a subset of the validation of the total object. Or you might require that your mobile interface has different validation requirements from your web site (one might use a captcha, while the other might use a touch based human validation for instance).
Either way, it's important to keep in mind that validation is important both at the client, server, and various layers...
Ok, let’s clarify a few things...
The notion of ViewModel (or the actual wording of ViewModel) is something introduced by Microsoft Martin Fowler. In fact, a ViewModel is nothing more than a simple class.
In reality, your Views are strongly typed to classes. Period. To avoid confusion, the wording ViewModel came up to help people understand that
“this class, will be used by your View”
hence why we call them ViewModel.
In addition, although many books, articles and examples use the word ViewModel, let's not forget that it's nothing more than just a Model.
In fact, did you ever noticed why there is a Models folder inside an MVC application and not a ViewModels folder?
Also, ever noticed how at the top of a View you have #model directive and not # viewmodel directive?
That's because everything could be a model.
By the way, for clarity, you are more than welcomed to delete (or rename) the Models folder and create a new one called ViewModels if that helps.
Regardless of what you do, you’ll ultimately call #model and not #viewmodel at the top of your pages.
Another similar example would be DTO classes. DTO classes are nothing more than regular classes but they are suffixed with DTO to help people (programmers) differentiate between all the other classes (including View Models).
In a recent project I’ve worked on, that notion wasn’t fully grasped by the team so instead of having their Views strongly typed to Models, they would have their Views strongly typed to DTO classes. In theory and in practice everything was working but they soon found out that they had properties such as IsVisible inside their DTO’s when in fact; these kind of properties should belongs to your ViewModel classes since they are used for UI logic.
So far, I haven’t answered your question but I do have a similar post regarding a quick architecture. You can read the post here
Another thing I’d like to point out is that if and only if your Service Layer plans on servicing other things such as a Winform application, Mobile web site, etc...then your Service Layer should not be receiving ViewModels.
Your Service Layer should not have the notion of what is a ViewModel. It should only accept, receive, send, etc... POCO classes.
This means that from your Controller, inside your ActionResult, once the ModelState is Valid, you need to transform your ViewModel into a POCO which in turn, will be sent to the method inside your Service Layer.
In other words, I’d use/install the Automapper nugget package and create some extension methods that would convert a ViewModel into a POCO and vice-versa (POCO into a ViewModel).
This way, your AddNewPerson() method would receive a Person object for its parameter instead of receiving a PersonViewModel parameter.
Remember, this is only valid if and only if your Service Layer plans on servicing other things...
If that's not the case, then feel free to have your Service Layer receive, send, add, etc...ViewModels instead of POCOs. This is up to you and your team.
Remember, there are many ways to skin a cat.
Hope this helps.
At work last week we had a meeting / presentation about rethinking how we do MVC, based on what's probably a lot of research by our boss and some reading into other SO questions. One takeaway for me was that when people say "separate logic from data" it would probably me more accurate to say "separate logic from your data source". If you do the first, you might fall prey to an anemic domain model. Am I correct in this?
Secondly we learned that MVC doesn't contain your business logic anywhere. This should be in a separate service layer or BLL apart from the web app. Reconciling these two points seems a bit tricky - does a particular piece of logic go with the data objects, as basic OOP principles dictate, or in a separate layer?
Here's a specific example that I need help with right now. I'm pretty convinced that this would belong in the service layer but I still have other questions. Let's say I have some behavior that takes as input multiple different entities of different types. It runs, and then as output, it can modify the input entities, and generate new entities as records. In my case it's for a game, but you could say it's like a transaction. There are multiple people involved, some products, and a receipt generated.
The easy question, where would you put this logic? Is it a separate class that gets instantiated?
The hard question (for me) is who is responsible for calling this code? It would feel wrong to have the controller do it. Or is that exactly its job? What if it doesn't get run on any one particular page, but whenever the user accesses the site after a particular time? Base controller?
In general, how do you decide between "this belongs in my entity class so that it isn't just a pile of getters and setters" and "this belongs in my service layer"? Or am I mixing things up... do the entity classes belong in the service layer?
Let's sort out some terminology first. What you're referring to as the "service layer" is more commonly called the "Domain model", as you say, not to be confused with a MVC model. At the most basic level, the MVC model encapsulates the domain model. How the two interact isn't defined by the pattern itself but the models store states the logical way is to realise there are two different states:
The domain state- in the real world this will more often than not be stored in a database somehow but the domain model should not expose any data source to the MVC model. This allows domain models to retain proper encapsulation. Any logic which mutates or accesses this data should be done here with relevant but abstract accessors for the MVC model to access.
The application state- that is things like "Which record is being edited at the moment?"
To answer your question it really depends on what you are doing with the data. If you're doing any kind of processing then this should be done in the domain model. If you're just fetching collections of data which are needed for display purposes then the MVC model should query the domain model(s) to retrieve the relevant data. The view should then inquire the model for this data.
So to answer your questions:
In thisspecific case: The transaction which processes the data should be inside the domain model. It has direct access to all the relevant data and should just be called with any required parameters. This promotes reusability because it's not directly tied to the MVC model.
Technically, if your controller is accessing the domain model directly it's closer to an MVVM implementation than an MVC one. However, this is not a bad thing, provided your domain models take arguments which aren't tied to domain logic there's not real issue. However a controller should not be constructing a domain object (e.g. creating a user account and passing it to the model). The reason for having the domain model which sits outside the MVC triad is for exactly that: So that it doesn't matter what calls the code, the domain logic is agnostic to the architecture it's running in. This is a good thing. MVC is presentaitonal, sometimes domain logic is just data processing. In regard to "whenever the user accesses the site after a particular time" this is domain logic so should certainly go in the domain model. Where depends on exactly what triggers the event, but in this case it could be part of the login routine or similar.
Indeed. The entities (by which I'm assuming you mean objects which refer to a single domain object, a user, a product, a blog, etc?) will probably not contain much logic themselves as they are mostly data structures. An order may have a "getProducts()" or "getDeliveryAddress()" which fetches related entities but the domain model would do any processing on the data itself.
As a rule of thumb, almost any logic that mutates data or processes data that comes from multiple entities should happen in the domain model. There are two main reasons for this: 1. Reusability, that logic can be reused from anywhere. 2. Encapsulation. Once you start putting this logic inside entities you end up with a situation where domain entities have dependencies on other domain entities. This leads to very brittle code in the real world as you end up with arbitrary rules being introduced at a later date such as "These customers don't have to enter payment details". "This is a corporate customer and they don't have a billing address" if you've modelled your "Order" class to be constructed with dependencies on a set or products a user and a billing address this becomes a larger task than dealing with that at an earlier stage in the domain model.
First, before anyone screams dupe, I had a hard time summarizing it in a simple title. Another title might have been "What is the difference between a domain model and MVC model?" or "What is a model?"
Conceptually, I understand a Model to be the data used by the views and controller. Beyond that, there seems to be a great deal of differing opinions on what makes up the model. What's a domain model, versus an app model, vs a view model, vs a service model, etc..
For example, in a recent question I asked about the repository pattern, I was told point blank that the repository is part of the model. However, I have read other opinions that the model should be seperated from the persistence model and the business logic layer. After all, isn't the Repository pattern supposed to decouple the concrete persistence method from the model? Other people say there is a difference between the Domain model and the MVC model.
Let's take a simple example. The AccountController that is included with the MVC default project. I've read several opinions that the Account code included is of poor design, violates SRP, etc.. etc.. If one were to design a "proper" Membership model for an MVC application, what would that be?
How would you seperate the ASP.NET services (Membership provider, role provider, etc..) from the model? Or would you at all?
The way I see it, the model should be "pure", perhaps with validation logic.. but should be seperate from business rules (other than validation). For example, let's say you have a business rule that says someone must be emailed when a new account is created. That doesn't really belong in the model in my view. So where does it belong?
Anyone care to shed any light on this issue?
The way I have done it - and I'm not saying it is right or wrong, is to have my View and then a model that applies to my view. This model only has what is relevant to my view - including data annotations and validation rules. The controller only houses logic for building the model. I have a service layer which houses all business logic. My controllers call my service layer. Beyond that is my repository layer.
My domain objects are housed separately (in their own project, actually). They have their own data annotations and validation rules. My repository validates the objects in my domain before saving them into the database. Because every object in my domain inherits from a base class which has validation built in, my repository is generic and validates everything (and requires it inherits from the base class).
You might think that having two sets of models is duplication of code, and it is to an extent. But, there are perfectly reasonable instances where the domain object is not appropriate for the view.
Case in point is when working with credit cards - I have to require a cvv when processing a payment, but I cannot store the cvv (it is a $50,000 fine to do so). But, I also want you to be able to edit your credit card - change of address, name, or expiration date. But you aren't going to give me the number or the cvv when editing it, and I certainly am not going to put your credit card number in plain text on the page. My domain has these values required for saving a new credit card because you give them to me, but my edit model doesn't even include the card number or cvv.
Another benefit to so many layers is that if architected correctly, you can use structuremap or another IoC container and swap out pieces without detrimentally affecting your application.
In my opinion, controller code should only be code targeted at the view. Show this, hide that, etc. The service layer should house the business logic for your app. I like having all of it in one place so it's easy to change or tweak a business rule. The repository layer should be relatively dumb - devoid of business logic and only query your data and return your domain objects. By separating the view models from the domain model, you have much more flexibility when it comes to custom validation rules. It also means you don't have to dump every piece of data into your view in hidden fields and push it back and forth between the client and server (or rebuild it on the backend). Your view model will then house only the information relevant to the view - and it can be customized to have bools for view logic or counts or enums so that the view itself isn't cluttered up with complicated logic statements like
<% if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(Model.SomeObject.SomeProperty) &&
Model.SomeObject.SomeInt == 3 && ...) { %>
While everything seems spread out and over-layered, it has a purpose for being architected this way. Is it perfect? not really. But I do prefer it to some past designs of calling repositories from the controller and having business logic mixed in the controller, repository, and model.
I too often wondered how exactly the MVC elements fit in a traditional web application structure, where you have views (pages), controllers, services, and data objects (model). As you said, there are many versions of that.
I believe the confusion exists because of the above stated, widely accepted architecture, which uses the "anemic domain model" (alleged)-anti pattern. I won't go into much details about the "anti-patternness" of anemic data model (you can look at an effort of mine to explain things here (Java-based, but relevant for any language)). But in short, it means that our model holds only data, and business logic is placed in services/managers.
But let's assume we have domain driven architecture, and our domain objects are the way they are expected to be - having both state and business logic. And in this domain-driven perspective things come into place:
the view is the UI
the controller gathers the inputs of the UI, invokes methods on the model, and sends back a response to the UI
the model is our business components - holding the data, but also having business logic.
I guess that answers your main questions. Things get complicated when we add some more layers, like the repository layer. It is often suggested that it should be invoked by the business logic placed in the model (and hence each domain object has a reference to a repository). In the article of mine that I linked I argue that this is not quite a best practice. And that in fact it is not a bad thing to have a service layer. By the way, domain-driven design does not exclude the service layer, but it is supposed to be 'thin', and only coordinating domain objects (so no business logic there).
For the anemic data model paradigm, which is widely adopted (for good or for bad), the model would be both the service layer and your data objects.
In my opinion,
Model -
Should not contain business logic, it should be pluggable(WCF like scenario). It is used to bind to view so, it should have properties.
Business Logic -
It should be placed at "Domain Services Layer", it is separate layer altogether.
Also, will add one more layer here "Application Services".
App Services talks to Domain Services layer to apply business logic and then lastly return the Model.
So,
Controller will ask Application Service for Model and the flow will go like,
Controller->Application Services(using domain services)->Model
The MVC pattern and the Asp.net framework makes no distinction on what the Model should be.
MS's own examples include persistence classes in the model. Your question about membership being in the model. This depends. Are classes in your model owned by something? Is there a link between who logs in and what data is displayed? Is there filtering of data part of a permissions system that is editable? Is who last updated or edited an object part of your domain as in somebody else needs to see it or something for backend support?
The email example is also it depends. Are you familiar with domain eventing or eventing in particular? Do you have a separate service to send emails? Is the act of sending an email part of your domain or is it a application level concern outside of the scope of your system? Does the UI need to know if an email was sent successfully or not? Do emails that fail to send need retries? Does the content of the email sent need to be stored for support or customer service requirements?
These types of questions are overly broad and subjective but I'm answering so you and everybody who voted you up can understand this.
Your requirements/timelines/resources all bleed into your system's architecture. Even the revenue model can have an effect. You also have to consider the pattern you are shooting for. DDD is much different than persistence-as-model applications and all the slop in between are also valid for certain apps. Are you shooting for testing the app? All of this has an effect.
most of the time in the service code I would have something like this:
public SomeService : ISomeService
{
ISomeRepository someRepository;
public Do(int id)
{
someRepository.Do(id);
}
}
so it's kinda redundant
so I started to use the repositories directly in the controller
is this ok ? is there some architecture that is doing like this ?
You lose the ability to have business logic in between.
I disagree with this one.
If business logic is where it should be - in domain model, then calling repo in controller (or better - use model binder for that) to get aggregate root and call method on it seems perfectly fine to me.
Application services should be used when there's too much technical details involved what would mess up controllers.
I've seen several people mention using model binders to call into a repo lately. Where is this crazy idea coming from?
I believe we are talking about 2 different things here. I suspect that Your 'model binder' means using model simultaneously as a view model too and binding changed values from UI directly right back to it (which is not a bad thing per se and in some cases I would go that road).
My 'model binder' is a class that implements 'IModelBinder', that takes repository in constructor (which is injected and therefore - can be extended if we need caching with some basic composition) and uses it before action is called to retrieve aggregate root and replace int id or Guid id or string slug or whatever action argument with real domain object. Combining that with input view model argument lets us to write less code. Something like this:
public ActionResult ChangeCustomerAddress
(Customer c, ChangeCustomerAddressInput inp){
c.ChangeCustomerAddress(inp.NewAddress);
return RedirectToAction("Details", new{inp.Id});
}
In my actual code it's a bit more complex cause it includes ModelState validation and some exception handling that might be thrown from inside of domain model (extracted into Controller extension method for reuse). But not much more. So far - longest controller action is ~10 lines long.
You can see working implementation (quite sophisticated and (for me) unnecessary complex) here.
Are you just doing CRUD apps with Linq To Sql or trying something with real domain logic?
As You can (hopefully) see, this kind of approach actually almost forces us to move towards task based app instead of CRUD based one.
By doing all data access in your service layer and using IOC you can gain lots of benefits of AOP like invisible caching, transaction management, and easy composition of components that I can't imagine you get with model binders.
...and having new abstraction layer that invites us to mix infrastructure with domain logic and lose isolation of domain model.
Please enlighten me.
I'm not sure if I did. I don't think that I'm enlightened myself. :)
Here is my current model binder base class. Here's one of controller actions from my current project. And here's "lack" of business logic.
If you use repositories in your controllers, you are going straight from the Data Layer to the Presentation Layer. You lose the ability to have business logic in between.
Now, if you say you will only use Services when you need business logic, and use Repositories everywhere else, your code becomes a nightmare. The Presentation Layer is now calling both the Business and Data Layer, and you don't have a nice separation of concerns.
I would always go this route: Repositories -> Services -> UI. As soon as you don't think you need a business layer, the requirements change, and you will have to rewrite EVERYTHING.
My own rough practices for DDD/MVC:
controllers are application-specific, hence they should only contain application-specific methods, and call Services methods.
all public Service methods are usually atomic transactions or queries
only Services instantiate & call Repositories
my Domain defines an IContextFactory and an IContext (massive leaky abstraction as IContext members are IDBSet)
each application has a sort-of Composition Root, which is mainly instantiating a Context Factory to pass to the Services (you could use DI container but not a big deal)
This forces me to keep my business code, and data-access out of my controllers. I find it a good discipline, given how loose I am when I don't follow the above!
Here is the thing.
"Business Logic" should reside in your entities and value objects.
Repositories deal with AggregateRoots only. So, using your repositories directly in your Controllers kinda feels like you are treating that action as your "service". Also, since your AggregateRoot may only refer to other ARs by its ID, you may have to call one more than one repo. It really gets nasty very quickly.
If you are going to have services, make sure you expose POCOs and not the actual AggregateRoot and its members.
Your repo shouldn't have to do any operations other than creating, retrieving, updating and deleting stuff. You may have some customized retrieve based on specific conditions, but that's about it. Therefore, having a method in your repo that matches one in your service... code smell right there.
Your service are API oriented. Think about this... if you were to pack that service in a .dll for me to use, how would you create your methods in a way that is easy for me to know what your service can do? Service.Update(object) doesn't make much sense.
And I haven't even talked about CQRS... where things get even more interesting.
Your Web Api is just a CLIENT of your Service. Your Service can be used by another service, right? So, think about it. You most likely will need a Service to encapsulate operations on AggregateRoots, usually by creating them, or retrieving them from a repo, do something about it, then returning a result. Usually.
Makes sense?
Even with "rich domain model" you will still need a domain service for handling business logic which involves several entities. I have also never seen CRUD without some business logic, but in simple sample code. I'd always like to go Martin's route to keep my code straightforward.