ASp.NET MVC - Is it possible to simplify my architecture?

Question

I have just started working on an MVC project and things are going ok but it looks like I am creating alot of spaghetti code with just too many objects. Can anyone see how I can simplify this solution before the whole projects gets out of hand?

ok, here's my set up:

DAL - has Entity framework connections and methods to obtain data then convert the data to my model objects in the model layer

BLL - sends the data back up to the UI Model - this contains all the model objects that are used throughout the site, anything coming from the DAL is converted into these objects by creating a new object then populating the variables.

UI - my MVC solution

The DAL,BLL and Model are also used by other solutions.

Now with MVC, I am trying to use the validation annotations ([Required], etc) which means I have to re-create the model objects with the annotations. This is fine but if I want to save the data back into the database I need to convert the classes which is just messy.

Can anyone see how I can use my current model class library with MVC model objects that use the validation annotations?

If I have not explained myself clearly please let me know and I will provide more details.

Thanks

Aliostad · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-03 11:13:46Z

3

Ideally there needs to be a separation from the domain models on one hand and MVC models (they are really ViewModels) on the other hand. This separation is really crucial and strongly advised.

These will look a lot similar in most cases although ViewModel can contain extra stuff. Then you can use AutoMapper to convert from one to the other.

For example:

public class User // in entity DLL
{
    [Required]
    public string Name {get; set;}
}

public class UserViewModel : User // in MVC DLL
{
    public string LastVisitedPage {get; set;} // which only MVC needs to know
}

Mapper.Map<User, UserViewModel>();
Mapper.Map<UserViewModel, User>();

answered May 3, 2012 at 11:13

Aliostad

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2 Comments

Funky Over a year ago

Hi, just got automapper and this is brilliant!!! thanks very much! This saves a lot of tedious mapping :)

Aliostad Over a year ago

@Funky yes, it is really a useful tool.

Kevin · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-03 11:16:10Z

you can put the metadata in metadata objects without recreating the model objects. Here is a very simple way of doing it, however it does require that the model objects themselves are marked as partial. I hope that is OK if not this solution will not work for you.

[MetadataType(typeof(PreviousResultsMetaData))]
public partial class PreviousResults
{
    public class PreviousResultsMetaData
    {
        [DisplayName("Class Ranking Score")]
        [Required]
        [Range(0.0, 100.0)]
        public object ClassRankingScore { get; set; }
    }
}

in the example above there is a data model object called PreviousResults that is created elsewhere by some scaffolding code. It defines the POCO object that is sent to and from database using LINQ. The MetadataType attribute indicates the class that will be used to hold the metadata. Then you simply create plain objects that match the names of your real data members and annotate them.

I hope this helps.

Yorgo · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-03 11:14:07Z

0

You can use FluentValidation framework for validation. Look here

http://fluentvalidation.codeplex.com/

answered May 3, 2012 at 11:14

Yorgo

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Styxxy · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-03 11:16:50Z

0

You can perfectly add attributes to your BLL (the business entities). Just add a reference and add a using statement for System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations. Apart from that, you can implement the IValidatableObject interface (which is pretty easy, see below).

For the mapping, you can use for example AutoMapper, so you don't have to write to much of mapping logic yourself (if you can take advantage of the name mapping magic).

Validate example:

ICollection<ValidationResult> validationErrors = new List<ValidationResult>();
var validationContext = new ValidationContext(this, null, null);
Validator.TryValidateObject(this, validationContext, ValidationErrors, true);

return validationErrors;

answered May 3, 2012 at 11:16

Styxxy

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