This week I have been looking at improving my understanding of a few programming terms, like SOLID and I will try and define them so I can look back here when I get confused.

MVC

I have previously blogged about MVC, but my understanding was not 100% correct so I will refine this here.

Model – Now this is where my understanding was not quite correct. I thought the model was the actual source data, eg an XML file, SQL database etc. The model is the business logic so this is a processed version of the source data. MVC does not care where data is stored it can be flat files, SQL, XML or anything really.

View – This displays data to the user and typically is the HTML/CSS markup. Only display related logic would get included in the view.

Controller – This is another place I had got a bit confused. I had thought all the logic lived here. This is incorrect controllers are only concerned with getting data between Model and View.

SOLID

SOLID are five principles of object oriented programming and design.

S is for Single Responsibility Principle. A class or piece of code should be responsible for doing one thing.

O is for Open/Closed Principle. Code should be open for extensions but closed for modifications. Often this refers to the way you can implement an interface and add extra functionality.

L is for Liskov Substitution Principle. Objects in a program can be replaced with subtypes of that object with out changing functionality.

I is for Interface Segregation Principle. Large interfaces should be split down into small interfaces so that clients only know about methods that are of interest.

D is for Dependency Inversion Principle. High and Low level modules should depend on abstractions.

I need to look into SOLID some more but here are some examples.

DRY

DRY is simply Don’t Repeat Yourself. It is often easy to spot when a function call will help you not have to use the same bit of code in different places. I am often spotting places where I can put this into action.