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about a year ago I set set up a solution consisting of an ASP.Net MVC 3 (now) presentation layer, application layer, domain layer and infrastructure layer (crosscutting stuff and data). I decided to keep the domain model in a separate project from the domain logic and use a relaxed approach to the presentation layer by passing the domain entities instead of DTO's since we really only have 1 front end right now.

We are going to be servicing a distributed layer soon, in addition to our main website and I will use DTO's there, but I am considering using DTO's in the main website also. I am also wondering if I should bother to break out the framework code in the domain layer (IRepository, IUnitOfWork, Entity/Value object supertypes etc). Well here, let me list out the questions I need feedback on:

1) I was pretty diligent about not having an anemic domain model and also watched out for behavior that was specific to the presentation concerns. Most of the business calculations that are needed are on the domain entities, is it ok for the presentation layer to call this behavior directly or should it instead call an application service that then calls the domain entities? This would suggest to me that there is no reason to have the presentation layer know about the domain entities and instead could use DTO's. Alternatively, I could have the DTO's expose these behaviors, but then I feel like I am robbing the domain entities. So I guess that is 3 options (Rich domain objects called directly, service layer or dto with behavior) which is best?

2) Right now I have a domain project, which has domain services, specifications and logic and is orchestrated by the application layer and separate project for the domain model (used by presentation layer and application layer). I also have framework interfaces for generic repository and unit of work pattern here. Should I break the framework stuff out into a separate project and combine the rest into one project?

3) I want to reorganize my domain layer into aggregates, right now all of the domain model is organized by modules, basically all the types for each module are in one namespace. Would it be better to organize the entities, value objects, services and other stuff by the aggregates?

4) Should I use the Separated Interface pattern for infrastructure services that are basically .net framework helper library types? For example configuration objects or validation runners? What is the benefit there in doing so?

5) Lastly, not many examples I have seen have used interfaces for domain entities. Almost every object I have I prefer to pass around interfaces for dependency reasons and it makes testing much easier. Is it valid to use interfaces instead of concretes? I should mention that we use EF 4.3.1 (soon to upgrade to latest version) and I seem to remember that EF had a problem with using interfaces or something. Should I be exposing interfaces instead of the domain entities?

Thank you very much in advance.

Project Structure:

Presentation.Web
     |       |
     |    Application
     |     |      |
Domain.Model - Domain

(Infrastructure.Data, Infrastructure.Core, Infrastructure.Security)

Explanation: Presentation.Web (MVC3 Web Project)

Application -- Service Layer that orchestrates the domain layer and responds to requests from the presentation layer (get this update that). This is organized by module, for example if I had a customer module I would have Application.Customer and in that would be all of the application services

Domain -- Contains domain services, specifications, calculations and other domain logic that is not exposed as behavior on domain entities. For example a calculation that involves several domain entities exposed as a domain service for the application layer to call. -- Also contains framework code for a specification framework and the main interfaces for a generic repository and unit of work pattern.

Domain.Model -- Contains the domain entities and enumerations. Organized by module. For example, if I might have a customer module which has a customer entity, customerorder entity etc. This is broken out away from the domain project so that the objects can be used by the application and presenation layer.

Infrastructure.Security -- Security infrastructure for authentication and authorization

Infrastructure.Core -- Cross-cutting stuff used by multiple layers (validators, logging, configuration, extensions, IoC, email etc..). Most of the projects depend on interfaces in this project (except domain.model) for infrastructure services.

Infrastructure.Data -- Repository Implementations via LINQ and EF 4.3.1, mapping layer, Unit of Work implementation. Interfaces are in Domain project (separated interfaces pattern)

user546077
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  • (1) What is the difference between your "domain model" and "domain logic"? What is in each project, and how do you understand the separation. What benefit do you get from their separation? (2) What are you calling a "module"? Do you mean a VB module? (3) What is the difference between your DTOs, your interfaces, and your domain model objects? Can you post a sample, and annotate which project each component is from? It would make it much easier to understand your design. We can help you, but we're guessing at too much. – smartcaveman Oct 09 '12 at 02:19
  • I will try to add the project structure after I get back from lunch. Until I get to that though, I will see if I can explain things a little better. The difference between domain model and domain logic is that domain model is just the entities where the domain logic I speak off is things like domain services and workflows that involve more than just one entities or are not exposed on the entiites as behavior. – user546077 Oct 09 '12 at 16:04
  • "Module" to me is a vertical slice of the system. Our system is basically a collection of "modules", each module has a substem to it. If you thought of MS office as an application, Outlook would be one module and Word would be another. – user546077 Oct 09 '12 at 16:04
  • The difference between DTO and an Interface and our Domain Module Objects is that DTO are dumb objects that transfer data between layers (flatten model), Domain Objects are rich with behavior and relationships to eachother and Interfaces would just be an abstraction of the domain object that clients (presentation layer) can bind too instead of binding to the domain objects directly (program to an interface). I will post a project structure update as soon as I can. Thanks – user546077 Oct 09 '12 at 16:05

1 Answers1

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1) First, determine whether your main website really needs to use the application layer. IMHO, if your application services and your main website are on the same web server, then you should evaluate whether the potential performance loss is worth having your main website call app server methods when it could call the domain objects directly. However, if your application server is definitely on another server, then yes, you should have the application server call your domain objects and pass only DTOs back and forth between it and any presentation layers you may have, including your main website.

2) This is really a question on preference of organization. Both are valid. You choose.

3) Anoter question on preference of organization. I, personally, organize my code by bounded context first. Then, I have entities and aggregate roots directly under them. Then, I have folders for Enumerations, Repositories (interfaces), Services (interfaces), Specifications, and Values. The namespaces do not reflect this organizational structure past the last bounded context folder. But, again, you should do this in the way that best suits the way you look at the code.

4) This is an implementation concern. I, personally, only break out implementation concerns into interfaces if I think there is a good possibility that I will need to swap out the implementations in the future. That being said, I usually organize my helper libraries into specific infrastructure contexts (eg. MainContext.Web.MVC.Helpers or MainContext.Web.WebForms.Helpers.) These rarely change and I have yet to come across an instance where I needed to swap out implementations entirely.

5) From my understanding, it is perfectly valid to use interfaces instead of concretes for your domain entities. That being said, I have yet to run into a case where I needed different implementations for my domain entities. The only reason I can even think of would be if you needed to change your business logic for one application, but leave an older application using the original business logic. If your business objects are good models for the domain, I can't fathom you actually running into this problem, but I have seen examples where people do this just for the sake of the abstraction. IMHO, that is not worth the extra coding effort, but if it makes you feel good inside or you get some actual benefit (eg. making testing easier), there isn't any reason why you can't abstract out your domain entities. That being said, domain services and repositories should definitely have contracts that allows you to swap out their implementations.

Answer 5 is derived from the idea that the application is the one who chooses the implementations. If you are trying to achieve onion architecture, then your application is going to be choosing the concrete implementations for everything (repositories, domain services, and other abstracted implementation concerns). I see no reason why it can't just use domain aggregates directly since they are the concrete representation of your domain model. (Note: All entities should be encapsulated into aggregates. The application should never be able to hold a reference to an entity that is not an aggregate under the context)

Aaron Hawkins
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