The MVC bankruptcy

@thanpolas

• Models represent a schema
• Models are FAT
• Business logic leaks to Controllers
• Handling of higher level operations
• MVC is not enough today

The MVC bankruptcy

@thanpolas

• Active Record (Single Table)
• Validations
• Relations
• Methods (db related)
• It's an ORM configuration

The MVC bankruptcy

Models represent a schema

@thanpolas

• You gotta see it to believe it
• Ok, I bet you've seen it!
• It's ugly
• It's not entirely the Model's fault
• Decouple

The Model bankruptcy

Models are FAT (core models > 4k lines)

@thanpolas

• Send verification email
• Perform multiple table OPs
• Talk to services
  • ​memcache
  • pupsub
  • redis

The MVC bankruptcy

Business logic leaks to Controllers

@thanpolas

The MVC bankruptcy

Business logic leaks to Controllers

How do you run the operation from a

• Cron Job?
• Back office?
• API?
• CLI?

@thanpolas

• Multiple tables involved
• Multiple Services involved
• Complex Auth Schemes
• Real Time

The MVC bankruptcy

Handling of higher level operations

@thanpolas

• Way more complex flows
• Service oriented design
• SaaS / PaaS Infrastructure
• Multiple inputs

The MVC bankruptcy

MVC is not enough today

@thanpolas

Core Principles

• Human readable API
• Normalised Input
• Normalised Output

@thanpolas

Core Principles

Human readable API

userEnt.create(udo);

userEnt.delete(uid);

userEnt.sendMessage(fromId, toId, message);

videoEnt.process(videoPath);

• Methods that make sense
• Think action not operation

@thanpolas

Core Principles

Normalised Input

userEnt.create({
    firstName: "Thanasis",
    lastName: "Polychronakis",
    email: "thanpolas@gmail.com",
});

• Well documented expectations
• No need to be validated

@thanpolas

Core Principles

Normalized Output

console.log(udoOut);
{
    "id": "3kdp349r7fhw",
    "firstName": "Thanasis",
    "lastName": "Polychronakis",
    "email": "thanpolas@gmail.com",
}

• Aggregates datasets
• Normalizes db idiomacies
• Consistency

@thanpolas

CRUD API

@thanpolas

The CRUD Primitives

• create()

• read()

• readOne()

• readLimit()

• update()

• delete()

• count()

@thanpolas

Validations

@thanpolas

Validations

• Is there an ORM CRUD OP?
• Perform actions before or after ORM?
• Do you trust your input?
  • Outside world?
  • Internal invocation?
  • Better not to trust anybody

@thanpolas

Are entities only for the backend?

@thanpolas

REMEMBER

Entities are

• Normalizers
• Aggregators
• Pipes
• Your business logic

@thanpolas