10 .NET Core Folder Structure Best Practices
If you're working with .NET Core, it's important to follow best practices for folder structure. This will help you keep your code organized and maintainable.
When developing .NET Core applications, it is important to have a well-structured folder structure. This helps to ensure that the application is organized and easy to maintain. It also helps to ensure that the application is scalable and can be easily extended.
In this article, we will discuss 10 best practices for structuring .NET Core applications. We will look at how to organize the application’s folders, how to name files, and how to structure the application’s code. By following these best practices, you can ensure that your .NET Core application is well-structured and easy to maintain.
1. Use the right folder structure
Having the right folder structure helps you organize your code and makes it easier to find what you need. It also allows for better scalability, as you can easily add new features or components without having to reorganize everything.
The recommended folder structure for .NET Core projects is:
– src/
– app/ (contains all application logic)
– tests/ (contains unit tests)
– libs/ (contains third-party libraries)
– web/ (contains web assets such as HTML, CSS, JavaScript, etc.)
By following this structure, you’ll be able to keep your project organized and make sure that all of your files are in the right place.
2. Keep your controllers lean and focused on handling HTTP requests
Controllers are the entry point for your application, and they should be responsible for handling HTTP requests. This means that controllers should not contain any business logic or data access code. Instead, these tasks should be delegated to services and repositories respectively. By keeping your controllers lean and focused on their primary purpose, you can ensure that your application is more maintainable and easier to debug.
3. Put business logic in services
Services are the layer of your application that contain all the business logic. This means they should be responsible for handling data validation, database interactions, and any other operations related to the core functionality of your application.
By keeping this code in services, you can easily reuse it across multiple parts of your application. Additionally, if you ever need to make changes or add new features, you’ll know exactly where to look. Finally, by separating out your business logic from other components, such as controllers and views, you can ensure that your code is more maintainable and easier to debug.
4. Create a separate project for your data layer
Having a separate project for your data layer allows you to keep the code related to accessing and manipulating data in one place. This makes it easier to maintain, debug, and update as needed. It also helps ensure that any changes made to the data layer don’t affect other parts of the application.
Additionally, having a separate project for your data layer can help improve performance by allowing you to cache frequently used queries or objects. Finally, it’s a good idea to use dependency injection when creating the data layer so that it can be easily swapped out if necessary.
5. Avoid putting too much code in Startup.cs
Startup.cs is the entry point for your application, and it’s responsible for configuring services and middleware that will be used throughout the application. If you put too much code in Startup.cs, it can become difficult to maintain and debug. It also makes it harder to test individual components of your application since they are all intertwined in one file.
Instead, try breaking up your code into separate files and folders based on their purpose. For example, create a folder for configuration settings, another for database access, and yet another for business logic. This way, each component can be tested independently and changes can be made without affecting other parts of the application.
6. Organize your views into folders based on their purpose
Organizing your views into folders based on their purpose helps keep the codebase organized and easy to navigate. It also makes it easier for developers to find what they need quickly, as well as identify any potential issues with the structure of the application. Additionally, organizing views into folders can help reduce clutter in the root folder, making it easier to maintain a clean project structure.
7. Add a ViewModels folder to keep view-specific models
ViewModels are models that contain data specifically tailored to a view. This means they can include properties from multiple entities, as well as additional properties that don’t exist in the database. By keeping these models separate from your other models, you can ensure that your code is more organized and easier to maintain.
Additionally, having a ViewModels folder makes it easier for developers to find the model they need when working on a specific view. This helps reduce development time and ensures that all views have access to the correct data.
8. Don’t put everything in Program.cs
Program.cs is the entry point of your application, and it should be kept as clean and concise as possible. It’s best to keep all logic out of Program.cs and instead put it in separate classes or files that can be referenced from Program.cs.
This helps make your code more organized and easier to maintain. For example, if you have a lot of business logic related to user authentication, it would be better to create a separate class for this logic rather than putting it all in Program.cs. This way, you can easily reference the authentication logic from other parts of your application without having to copy and paste the same code over and over again.
9. Consider using an IoC container
An IoC container is a software design pattern that allows developers to decouple the dependencies between components in their application. This makes it easier to maintain and test code, as well as make changes without having to rewrite large portions of the codebase.
Using an IoC container also helps keep your folder structure organized by allowing you to separate out different types of files into distinct folders. For example, you can create a folder for services, another for models, and yet another for repositories. This makes it much easier to find what you need when working on a project.
10. Separate concerns with feature folders
Feature folders help to keep related code together, making it easier for developers to find and maintain the code. This also helps with scalability as your application grows in size and complexity.
Feature folders should be organized by feature or domain, such as Controllers, Services, Models, Views, etc. Each folder should contain all of the files related to that particular feature. For example, a Controller folder might include controller classes, view models, and other related files.
By following this best practice, you can ensure that your .NET Core project is well-structured and easy to navigate.