The process of software development is complicated. When we face problems, we usually try to tackle the complexity by turning it into more understandable and manageable pieces.
Domain-Driven Design is a software development methodology for tackling complex software projects to deliver an end-product that meets the goals of the organization. In fact, Domain-Driven Design promotes focusing the project on an evolving core model.
Domain-Driven Design was written by Eric Evans in 2003. It is a combination of widely accepted best practices along with Evans’s own insights and experiences. If you are new to the idea of Domain-Driven Design, there is a lot to learn in this book.
It will teach you how to effectively model the real world in your application and use OOP to encapsulate the business logic of the organization. This is how Martin Fowler [Biggest software Artisan Lecture] describes it:
In his excellent book Domain Driven Design, Eric Evans creates a classification of the different kinds of domain objects that you're likely to run into.
In my opinion, a Domain Model is your perception of the context in which it applies. Let me describe it a bit more. Domain itself means the world of the business you are working with and the problems they want to solve. For example, if you want to develop an app for online food delivery, your domain will be everything (problems, business rules, etc.) about online food delivery that needs to be done in your project.
Model means your solutions to the problems of Domain. Exactly, in fact, Model is in the brain of the business expert. Domain is not a chart, UML, code or a diagram; Model is the Idea of how to draw diagrams. The Model should be focused on knowledge around a specific problem that is simplified and structured to provide a solution.
The Domain Model is your structured solution to the problem. The Domain Model should represent the vocabulary and key concepts of the problems of domain.
Ubiquitous Language is the language that is used by business experts to describe the Domain Model. It means that the development team uses the language consistently in all communications, and also in the code. This language should be based on the Domain Model. Here's the definition of ubiquitous language by Eric Evans:
By using the model-based language pervasively and not being satisfied until it flows, we approach a model that is complete and comprehensible, made up of simple elements that combine to express complex ideas.
Let me give an example:
$product = new Entity/Product();
$product->setTitle( new Title('Mobile Phone'));
$product->setPrice( new Price('1000'));
$this->em->persist($product);
$this->em->flush();
In the code above, I create a new product, but in the application the product must be added, not created:
//add is a static method in product class
$product = Product::add(
new Title('Mobile Phone'),
new Price('1000')
);
In a development team, if someone creates a product and someone else adds a product, this will violate ubiquitous language. In this case, if in the product add method we have some extra actions such as sending email, they all will be missed, and also the definition of adding a product in the team will change. We would have two different definitions for one term.
In this article, I am not planning to talk about object-oriented design. But Domain-Driven Design proposes the fundamentals of a good design. Eric Evans believes:
Developing a good domain model is an art.
In order to develop a good domain model, you need to know about Model-Driven Design. The connection of the model and the implementation is called Model-Driven Design. The Layered Architecture is one of the Model-Driven Design blocks.

In order to tackle complexity, we need to separate concerns, i.e. isolate every part of the design to concentrate more on specific sections. The system must be able to interact between sections. Layered Architecture is the idea of isolation of each part based on years of experience and convention. The Layers are listed below:
Let's describe each layer with details.
The User Interface is responsible for showing information to the user and interpreting the user’s commands. In Laravel, the view is the User Interface (presentation) Layer.
The Application Layer is the way we communicate with the world outside (out of the application domain). This layer behaves as a public API for our application. It does not contain business rules or knowledge. Controllers in Laravel are located here.
The Domain Layer is the heart of business software. This layer is responsible for representing the concepts of the business, information about the business situation, and business rules.
The Infrastructure Layer provides generic technical capabilities that support the higher layers and also support the pattern of interactions between the four layers (that is why repositories are located in this layer).
Let me describe it a bit more. For example, if we are an email company (such as Gmail), the email would be in the model layer, but if we are a food delivery company, email would be in our infrastructure layer. Why? Because sending email for food delivery is not vital.

Connection between layers is mandatory, but without losing the benefit of the separation. The connection would be in one direction. As you see in the schema above, the upper layers can communicate with lower layers. If the lower layers need to connect with an upper layer, they must use patterns such as callbacks or observers.
If you are inspired to see how Domain-Driven Design could be applied to a project that is being built with Laravel 5 as the underlying framework, I will describe the folder structure in this article and come up with other definitions in follow-up articles. In order to create the folder structure, we need to create a folder structure in our app folder of the root directory, as shown below:
├── Presentation ├── Application ├── Domain ├── Infrastructure
Presentation is the view, where we put our blade files. Application is where we put our controllers. Laravel 5 lets us configure the namespace of our controller in App/Providers/RouteServiceProvider.php:
protected $namespace = 'App\Application\controllers';
And also you can configure the path of view in config/view.php:
//...
'paths' => [
realpath(base_path('App/Presentation')),
//...
Now we have just configured the folder structure of Laravel. If you're wondering where Laravel's default model would be located, I should mention that a real repository in Domain-Driven Design must work with a simple PHP object as a database object, and Laravel Eloquent (Active Record) is a God object (big ball of mud). Also, to have good aggregates, we need to use Datamapper (Doctrine ORM) instead of Active Record.
This article is one of a series on Domain-Driven Design in Laravel. Laravel needs some extra packages and configuration to be adopted with Domain-Driven Design.
As you can see, I have presented the core concepts, but I believe it may be hard to grasp it alone. I will cover more in the next articles of this series.
The Best Small Business Web Designs by DesignRush
/
-1Create Modern Vue Apps Using Create-Vue and Vite
/
5Pros and Cons of Using WordPress
/
-4How to Fix the “There Has Been a Critical Error in Your Website” Error in WordPress
/
1How To Fix The “There Has Been A Critical Error in Your Website” Error in WordPress
How to Create a Privacy Policy Page in WordPress
/
7WordPress Website Maintenance Guide For Beginners
/
6How Long Does It Take to Learn JavaScript?
/
-1How Long Does it Take to Learn JavaScript
/
1The Best Way to Deep Copy an Object in JavaScript
/
-2
4
-6Adding and Removing Elements From Arrays in JavaScript
/
-1Create a JavaScript AJAX Post Request: With and Without jQuery
/
95 Real-Life Uses for the JavaScript reduce() Method
/
-10How to Enable or Disable a Button With [removed] jQuery vs. Vanilla
/
2How to Enable or Disable a Button With [removed] jQuery vs Vanilla
/
-3Confirm Yes or No With JavaScript
/
-2How to Change the URL in [removed] Redirecting
/
-415+ Best WordPress Twitter Widgets
/
-227 Best Tab and Accordion Widget Plugins for WordPress (Free & Premium)
/
1121 Best Tab and Accordion Widget Plugins for WordPress (Free & Premium)
/
-1130 HTML Best Practices for Beginners
/
-831 Best WordPress Calendar Plugins and Widgets (With 5 Free Plugins)
/
425 Ridiculously Impressive HTML5 Canvas Experiments
/
-6How to Implement Email Verification for New Members
/
3How to Create a Simple Web-Based Chat Application
/
530 Popular WordPress User Interface Elements
/
-5Top 18 Best Practices for Writing Super Readable Code
/
3Best Affiliate WooCommerce Plugins Compared
/
-1018 Best WordPress Star Rating Plugins
/
1410+ Best WordPress Twitter Widgets
/
420+ Best WordPress Booking and Reservation Plugins
/
5Working With Tables in React: Part Two
/
-4Best CSS Animations and Effects on CodeCanyon
/
-1630 CSS Best Practices for Beginners
/
4How to Create a Custom WordPress Plugin From Scratch
/
510 Best Responsive HTML5 Sliders for Images and Text… and 3 Free Options
/
-416 Best Tab and Accordion Widget Plugins for WordPress
/
-418 Best WordPress Membership Plugins and 5 Free Plugins
/
325 Best WooCommerce Plugins for Products, Pricing, Payments and More
/
310 Best WordPress Twitter Widgets
1 /
1512 Best Contact Form PHP Scripts for 2020
/
-420 Popular WordPress User Interface Elements
/
-210 Best WordPress Star Rating Plugins
/
-412 Best CSS Animations on CodeCanyon
/
112 Best WordPress Booking and Reservation Plugins
/
120 Best WordPress Calendar Plugins and Widgets
/
-212 Elegant CSS Pricing Tables for Your Latest Web Project
/
724 Best WordPress Form Plugins for 2020
/
-214 Best PHP Event Calendar and Booking Scripts
/
-2Create a Blog for Each Category or Department in Your WooCommerce Store
/
28 Best WordPress Booking and Reservation Plugins
/
-17Best Exit Popups for WordPress Compared
/
20Best Exit Popups for WordPress Compared
/
-611 Best Tab & Accordion WordPress Widgets & Plugins
/
-1012 Best Tab & Accordion WordPress Widgets & Plugins
1New Course: Practical React Fundamentals
/
3Short Course: Better Angular App Architecture With Modules
/
3Preview Our New Course on Angular Material
/
4Object-Oriented PHP With Classes and Objects
/
3Best Practices for ARIA Implementation
/
-3Accessible Apps: Barriers to Access and Getting Started With Accessibility
/
-3Dramatically Speed Up Your React Front-End App Using Lazy Loading
/
1915 Best Modern JavaScript Admin Templates for React, Angular, and Vue.js
/
-1515 Best Modern JavaScript Admin Templates for React, Angular and Vue.js
/
219 Best JavaScript Admin Templates for React, Angular, and Vue.js
/
3New Course: Build an App With JavaScript and the MEAN Stack
/
12Hands-on With ARIA: Accessibility Recipes for Web Apps
/
910 Best WordPress Facebook Widgets
13 /
-5Hands-on With ARIA: Accessibility for eCommerce
/
5New eBooks Available for Subscribers
/
-5Hands-on With ARIA: Homepage Elements and Standard Navigation
/
10
-8Site Accessibility: Getting Started With ARIA
/
4How Secure Are Your JavaScript Open-Source Dependencies?
/
-1New Course: Secure Your WordPress Site With SSL
/
-3Testing Components in React Using Jest and Enzyme
/
-9Testing Components in React Using Jest: The Basics
/
-515 Best PHP Event Calendar and Booking Scripts
/
-1Create Interactive Gradient Animations Using Granim.js
/
10How to Build Complex, Large-Scale Vue.js Apps With Vuex
1Examples of Dependency Injection in PHP With Symfony Components
/
-6Set Up Routing in PHP Applications Using the Symfony Routing Component
1 /
10A Beginner’s Guide to Regular Expressions in JavaScript
/
13Introduction to Popmotion: Custom Animation Scrubber
/
-5Introduction to Popmotion: Pointers and Physics
/
-10New Course: Connect to a Database With Laravel’s Eloquent ORM
/
-5How to Create a Custom Settings Panel in WooCommerce
/
-13Building the DOM faster: speculative parsing, async, defer and preload
120 Useful PHP Scripts Available on CodeCanyon
3 /
50How to Find and Fix Poor Page Load Times With Raygun
/
1Introduction to the Stimulus Framework
/
-14Single-Page React Applications With the React-Router and React-Transition-Group Modules
/
1
712 Best Contact Form PHP Scripts
1 /
-4Getting Started With the Mojs Animation Library: The ShapeSwirl and Stagger Modules
/
2Getting Started With the Mojs Animation Library: The Shape Module
/
-4Getting Started With the Mojs Animation Library: The HTML Module
/
5Project Management Considerations for Your WordPress Project
/
-88 Things That Make Jest the Best React Testing Framework
/
4Creating an Image Editor Using CamanJS: Layers, Blend Modes, and Events
/
-2New Short Course: Code a Front-End App With GraphQL and React
Creating an Image Editor Using CamanJS: Applying Basic Filters
/
-13Creating an Image Editor Using CamanJS: Creating Custom Filters and Blend Modes
Challenge: Create a To-Do List in React
1 /
2Deploy PHP Web Applications Using Laravel Forge
/
-1Getting Started With the Mojs Animation Library: The Burst Module
/
6
-910 Things Men Can Do to Support Women in Tech
/
1A Gentle Introduction to Higher-Order Components in React: Best Practices
/
-4Challenge: Build a React Component
/
-4A Gentle Introduction to HOC in React: Learn by Example
/
5A Gentle Introduction to Higher-Order Components in React
/
-7Creating Pretty Popup Messages Using SweetAlert2
/
4Creating Stylish and Responsive Progress Bars Using ProgressBar.js
/
1818 Best Contact Form PHP Scripts for 2022
/
-3Creating a Blogging App Using Angular & MongoDB: Delete Post
/
-17Set Up an OAuth2 Server Using Passport in Laravel
/
1Creating a Blogging App Using Angular & MongoDB: Edit Post
/
-2Creating a Blogging App Using Angular & MongoDB: Add Post
/
-1Creating a Blogging App Using Angular & MongoDB: Show Post
/
9Creating a Blogging App Using Angular & MongoDB: Home
/
9
3Creating a Blogging App Using Angular & MongoDB: Login
/
13Creating Your First Angular App: Implement Routing
/
12Persisted WordPress Admin Notices: Part 4
/
-4Creating Your First Angular App: Components, Part 2
/
4Persisted WordPress Admin Notices: Part 3
/
3How Laravel Broadcasting Works
/
1
9Persisted WordPress Admin Notices: Part 2
/
-3Create Your First Angular App: Storing and Accessing Data
/
2Persisted WordPress Admin Notices: Part 1
/
-3Error and Performance Monitoring for Web & Mobile Apps Using Raygun
/
7Using Luxon for Date and Time in JavaScript
7 /
-6How to Create an Audio Oscillator With the Web Audio API
/
-4How to Cache Using Redis in Django Applications
/
220 Essential WordPress Utilities to Manage Your Site
/
-5Introduction to API Calls With React and Axios
/
18Beginner’s Guide to Angular 4: HTTP
/
11Rapid Web Deployment for Laravel With GitHub, Linode, and RunCloud.io
/
9Beginners Guide to Angular 4: Routing
/
-9Beginner’s Guide to Angular 4: Components
/
1Creating a Drop-Down Menu for Mobile Pages
/
4Introduction to Forms in Angular 4: Writing Custom Form Validators
/
510 Best WordPress Booking & Reservation Plugins
/
1Getting Started With Redux: Connecting Redux With React
/
15Getting Started With Redux: Learn by Example
/
16Getting Started With Redux: Why Redux?
/
9Understanding Recursion With JavaScript
/
-3How to Auto Update WordPress Salts
/
-7How to Download Files in Python
/
-3
-22Eloquent Mutators and Accessors in Laravel
1 /
18
-11
1210 Best HTML5 Sliders for Images and Text
/
6Site Authentication in Node.js: User Signup
/
-5Creating a Task Manager App Using Ionic: Part 2
/
2Creating a Task Manager App Using Ionic: Part 1
/
1
3Introduction to Forms in Angular 4: Template-Driven Forms
/
-224 Essential WordPress Utilities to Manage Your Site
/
-225 Essential WordPress Utilities to Manage Your Site
/
-11Get Rid of Bugs Quickly Using BugReplay
1 /
-15Manipulating HTML5 Canvas Using Konva: Part 1, Getting Started
/
710 Must-See Easy Digital Downloads Extensions for Your WordPress Site
/
-122 Best WordPress Booking and Reservation Plugins
/
-6Understanding ExpressJS Routing
/
-715 Best WordPress Star Rating Plugins
/
12Inheritance and Extending Objects With JavaScript
/
-9Introduction to the CSS Grid Layout With Examples
1 /
2
8Performant Animations Using KUTE.js: Part 5, Easing Functions and Attributes
/
-8Performant Animations Using KUTE.js: Part 4, Animating Text
/
-13Performant Animations Using KUTE.js: Part 3, Animating SVG
/
-10New Course: Code a Quiz App With Vue.js
/
-1Performant Animations Using KUTE.js: Part 2, Animating CSS Properties
/
3
8Performant Animations Using KUTE.js: Part 1, Getting Started
/
210 Best Responsive HTML5 Sliders for Images and Text (Plus 3 Free Options)
/
-3Single-Page Applications With ngRoute and ngAnimate in AngularJS
/
-12Deferring Tasks in Laravel Using Queues
/
-4
4Site Authentication in Node.js: User Signup and Login
/
12Working With Tables in React, Part Two
/
-16Working With Tables in React, Part One
/
6How to Set Up a Scalable, E-Commerce-Ready WordPress Site Using ClusterCS
/
-2New Course on WordPress Conditional Tags
/
3TypeScript for Beginners, Part 5: Generics
/
1
-11Building With Vue.js 2 and Firebase
6 /
10
-8
1Best Unique Bootstrap JavaScript Plugins
/
-9
-5Essential JavaScript Libraries and Frameworks You Should Know About
/
7
2Vue.js Crash Course: Create a Simple Blog Using Vue.js
/
-13Build a React App With a Laravel RESTful Back End: Part 1, Laravel 5.5 API
/
4API Authentication With Node.js
/
-4Beginner’s Guide to Angular: HTTP
/
7Beginner’s Guide to Angular: Routing
/
-4Beginners Guide to Angular: Routing
/
-5Beginner’s Guide to Angular: Services
/
4How to Create a Custom Authentication Guard in Laravel
/
6Learn Computer Science With [removed] Part 3, Loops
/
-3Build Web Applications Using Node.js
/
1Learn Computer Science With [removed] Part 4, Functions
/
4Learn Computer Science With [removed] Part 2, Conditionals
/
14Learn Computer Science With [removed] Part 1, The Basics
/
-4Create Interactive Charts Using Plotly.js, Part 5: Pie and Gauge Charts
/
-9Create Interactive Charts Using Plotly.js, Part 4: Bubble and Dot Charts
/
18Create Interactive Charts Using Plotly.js, Part 3: Bar Charts
/
-13Awesome JavaScript Libraries and Frameworks You Should Know About
/
-4Create Interactive Charts Using Plotly.js, Part 2: Line Charts
/
-8Bulk Import a CSV File Into MongoDB Using Mongoose With Node.js
/
-4Build a To-Do API With Node, Express, and MongoDB
/
-7Getting Started With End-to-End Testing in Angular Using Protractor
/
9TypeScript for Beginners, Part 4: Classes
/
-10Object-Oriented Programming With JavaScript
/
610 Best Affiliate WooCommerce Plugins Compared
/
8Stateful vs. Stateless Functional Components in React
/
10Make Your JavaScript Code Robust With Flow
/
-6Build a To-Do API With Node and Restify
/
7Testing Components in Angular Using Jasmine: Part 2, Services
/
2Testing Components in Angular Using Jasmine: Part 1
/
-2Creating a Blogging App Using React, Part 6: Tags
/
-11React Crash Course for Beginners, Part 3
/
3React Crash Course for Beginners, Part 2
/
11React Crash Course for Beginners, Part 1
/
2Set Up a React Environment, Part 4
1 /
8Set Up a React Environment, Part 3
/
-11New Course: Get Started With Phoenix
/
-10Set Up a React Environment, Part 2
/
2Command Line Basics and Useful Tricks With the Terminal
/
5How to Create a Real-Time Feed Using Phoenix and React
/
-8Build a React App With a Laravel Back End: Part 2, React
/
2Build a React App With a Laravel RESTful Back End: Part 1, Laravel 9 API
/
-7Creating a Blogging App Using React, Part 5: Profile Page
/
-5Pagination in CodeIgniter: The Complete Guide
/
23JavaScript-Based Animations Using Anime.js, Part 4: Callbacks, Easings, and SVG
/
-1JavaScript-Based Animations Using Anime.js, Part 3: Values, Timeline, and Playback
Learn to Code With [removed] Part 1, The Basics
/
510 Elegant CSS Pricing Tables for Your Latest Web Project
/
-7Getting Started With the Flux Architecture in React
/
-3Getting Started With Matter.js: The Composites and Composite Modules
/
4Getting Started With Matter.js: The Engine and World Modules
/
1310 More Popular HTML5 Projects for You to Use and Study
/
-24Understand the Basics of Laravel Middleware
/
-6Iterating Fast With Django & Heroku
/
8Creating a Blogging App Using React, Part 4: Update & Delete Posts
/
3Creating a jQuery Plugin for Long Shadow Design
/
-10How to Register & Use Laravel Service Providers
2 /
-13Unit Testing in React: Shallow vs. Static Testing
/
5Creating a Blogging App Using React, Part 3: Add & Display Post
/
15Creating a Blogging App Using React, Part 2: User Sign-Up
20 /
-5Creating a Blogging App Using React, Part 1: User Sign-In
/
99 More Popular HTML5 Projects for You to Use and Study
/
18Creating a Grocery List Manager Using Angular, Part 2: Managing Items
/
9Dynamic Page Templates in WordPress, Part 3
/
-2Angular vs. React: 7 Key Features Compared
/
5Creating a Grocery List Manager Using Angular, Part 1: Add & Display Items
/
3New eBooks Available for Subscribers in June 2017
/
7Create Interactive Charts Using Plotly.js, Part 1: Getting Started
/
11The 5 Best IDEs for WordPress Development (And Why)
/
133 Popular WordPress User Interface Elements
/
2New Course: How to Hack Your Own App
/
-10How to Install Yii on Windows or a Mac
/
5What Is a JavaScript Operator?
/
-5How to Register and Use Laravel Service Providers
/
7
waly Good blog post. I absolutely love this…