ASP.Net MVC Architecture - Missing a layer?

Question

I am using the Entity Framework/Repository-UnitOfWork/Service layer method on this ASP.NET MVC Application and it works great, but it seems a layer might be missing in order to keep the controllers thin.

Lets take for example a user authentication scenario:

1) The AuthenticationController takes a IAuthenticationService which in turn takes a IUnitOfWork and IRepository<User> (I am using generic repositories).

2) In the controller I want to make its only concern that the service authenticates the user:

if (userService.AuthenticateUser(model.userName, model.password)) {
    FormsAuthentication.SetCookie(...);
    return RedirectToAction(...);
}

return View(model);

Some will say this is too much logic in the controller right? So it seems as though we might need a Application Manager if you will:

if (appManager.AuthenticateUser(model.userName, model.password)) {
    // Here the app manager calls the service???
    return RedirectToAction(...);
}

I am trying to keep my domain services agnostic of the consuming application so I can use them on MVC, WinForms, Console, WPF, WCF, etc.

My service layers only return domain objects, I need a place to transform them into View Models, but I want to keep that out of the controllers.

Any input on this would be great!!

Answer 1

Typically, one would use something like AutoMapper to map your domain objects to ViewModels. Then you only have a Map call that wraps your service layer. There is little reason to introduce an entirely new layer just for object mapping.