Domain Overview
Before we dive into implementation, let's understand the core domain objects that will make up our blog platform.
These objects and their relationships form the foundation of our application's data model.
Core Domain Objects
User
Users represent the authors of our blog platform.
Each user requires a unique identifier and email address for authentication, along with a securely stored password.
Users have a display name that appears on their posts and we track when they joined the platform.
A single user can create multiple blog posts, and we maintain this relationship to properly attribute content and manage permissions.
Post
Posts serve as the central content type in our platform.
Each post contains a title and the main content body, along with metadata such as creation and update timestamps.
Posts must be associated with an author (User) and assigned to a Category, while optionally being tagged with multiple Tags.
Posts can exist in either a draft or published state, and we calculate an estimated reading time based on the content length.
This object forms the heart of our platform, connecting to users, categories, and tags.
Category
Categories provide a mandatory, high-level organization system for our content.
Each category has a unique identifier and name, and it maintains a collection of all posts assigned to it.
We track the number of published posts in each category to help with navigation and content discovery.
Categories are straightforward but essential, as every post must belong to exactly one category to maintain clear content organization.
Tag
Tags offer a flexible way to classify content beyond the primary categorization.
Each tag has a unique identifier and name, and it can be associated with any number of posts. Unlike categories, tags are optional and posts can have multiple tags.
We track the number of posts associated with each tag to help users discover related content.
Tags enable cross-cutting content organization that complements the hierarchical category structure.
Domain Relationships
Our domain objects form an interconnected web of relationships that define how content is organized and accessed.
Users create posts, establishing a one-to-many relationship where a single user can author many posts, but each post has exactly one author.
Categories also have a one-to-many relationship with posts, as each post must belong to exactly one category, while categories can contain multiple posts.
Tags and posts form a many-to-many relationship, allowing posts to have multiple tags and tags to be associated with multiple posts, requiring a join table in our database implementation.
Summary
- Users create and own posts
- Posts connect to users, categories, and tags
- Categories provide mandatory, high-level organization
- Tags enable flexible, optional content classification
