Core (Basic Libraries)
Introduction
The Core (Basic Libraries) are the foundation of the Machanism ecosystem. They encapsulate essential business rules, shared entities, and reusable workflows that form the backbone for modular and scalable applications. These libraries are universal—flexible enough to support diverse business domains while ensuring stability and reusability across projects.
As Robert C. Martin emphasized: "Software architecture is the art of drawing lines that I call boundaries." The Core Libraries represent these boundaries in their purest form. They enforce independence and isolation, enabling scalable systems that evolve without disruption.
What is a Core Project?
Core Projects, or Basic Libraries, contain the fundamental elements necessary for designing modular solutions. These are not application-specific—they are generic libraries that provide the building blocks for higher-level workflows.
Here’s what a Core Project does:
- Defines Shared Entities: Representing the conceptual objects (like Orders, Products, Customers) that encapsulate business policies and rules.
- Implements Use Cases: Core workflows align with core business processes, such as creating orders, calculating prices, or managing inventory.
- Provides Adapters: Core adapters act as interfaces for connecting the Core logic to external systems, ensuring modularity and flexibility.
- Promotes Independence: Core components operate independently of technical frameworks, databases, and UI layers, preserving scalability and adaptability.
Core in Action
Core Projects play a crucial role in maintaining architectural integrity throughout the software lifecycle. Imagine building an e-commerce solution:
- Core Product Entities define essential data structures like pricing, descriptions, and stock levels.
- Core Order Interactors implement workflows for validating and processing purchase orders.
- Core Payment Entities facilitate the foundational logic for payment systems.
An Application or MachaOn Project integrates these Core Libraries, but the Core remains pure—untouched by specific business implementations.
Benefits of Core Projects
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Reusability Across Projects
- Core Libraries are universal—they are shared across multiple applications without modification.
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Scalability and Flexibility
- Because Core components are independent of external systems, they scale seamlessly, even as workflows evolve.
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Consistency in Business Rules
- Core encapsulates the critical rules that define business processes, ensuring consistency across all connected modules and workflows.
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Clean Separation of Concerns
- Core maintains strict boundaries that isolate business logic from implementation details, ensuring long-term maintainability.
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Foundation for Customization
- Core Libraries provide the base layer for Applications Projects, enabling customization while preventing disruption to shared functionality.
Structure of Core Projects
Core Projects are designed with modular simplicity, ensuring compatibility and scalability across the ecosystem.
Entities
These define domain objects, or conceptual representations of business concepts, such as Orders, Users, or Products.
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Encapsulation: Entities encapsulate business rules and behaviors.
Example: A Product entity includes pricing calculations, descriptions, and attributes.
Use Cases
Use cases implement workflows based on the system’s essential functions.
- Examples:
- Validating an order during checkout.
- Updating inventory levels after a purchase.
Adapters
Adapters provide interfaces to connect Core logic with external systems, ensuring implementation details are abstracted away.
- Examples:
- Connecting Core workflows to external APIs like payment processors.
- Integrating domain logic with infrastructure components such as databases or queues.
How Core Projects Ensure Stability
Core Libraries adhere to Clean Architecture principles, ensuring the stability needed for large-scale applications.
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Independence of Business Logic Core modules remain decoupled from frameworks or technical dependencies, allowing system processes to evolve independently.
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Boundary Enforcement Strict architectural boundaries prevent tight coupling between workflows and external systems. No direct dependencies, no shortcuts, and no compromises—just clean, modular design.
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Reusable and Extendable While Core Libraries provide generic components to support shared business logic, their design allows seamless customization without breaking functionality.
Core Projects in the Machanism Ecosystem
Core Projects act as the groundwork for all other projects within Machanism, including Applications and MachaOn Projects.
By defining reusable components, workflows, and boundaries, Core Projects ensure that higher-level modules such as adapters, APIs, and infrastructure layers remain cleanly integrated while operating independently.
This separation ensures modularity across the board, allowing teams to reuse shared logic across projects and scale systems without added complexity.
Why Core Projects Matter?
Without a strong Core, systems become fragile, tightly coupled, and difficult to scale. Core Projects provide the stability needed to prevent this by enforcing principles like modularity, scalability, and reusability.
By investing in strong Core Libraries, developers can build systems that:
- Scale effortlessly as workflows grow more complex.
- Remain modular across multiple applications and domains.
- Avoid tight coupling and monolithic pitfalls by enforcing clean boundaries.
Final Thoughts
Core Projects are where reusability meets scalability. They provide the building blocks that keep applications stable, adaptable, and maintainable—empowering developers to focus on what matters: creating robust solutions to solve real-world problems.
At the center of the Machanism philosophy, Core Libraries ensure that every system component contributes to the larger architecture without friction.
Every core is stable. Every boundary is respected. Every system scales.
And as always, remember: Divide and Use!