[Catalyst] Begginer's question about application structure

[Martin Bendix]

Hi,

As a Perl and Catalyst novice, I have recently completed the online Catalyst 
tutorial, and read the Definitive Guide to Catalyst.  However, I have a few 
questions about the basic structure of a thin controller, fat model application.

I'd like to take my learning to the next stage by writing a fully functioning 
application, and the classic CD database seems like a good place to start - it 
will at least be of use to me when it's done.

Given the following basic criteria, I would be grateful for some high-level 
advice on how best to organise the application:

* I will be using DBIx::Class to access the database.
* At first, the initial user interface will be web based.
* I'd like to structure the application so that I can add additional interfaces 
with relative ease in future (e.g., command line, web services, etc.).
* I'd like to create test scripts for as many of the modules/application 
functions as possible.
* The application will provide the ability to create, search, update and delete 
artists, tracks, and CDs.

I think that my understanding of the following is correct, but I would 
appreciate any advice or pointers:

My model should be well separated from the controller.  Most, if not all of the 
application functionality should be exposed via the model, so that the Catalyst 
controller only needs to make simple calls to the model.  To do this, model 
classes should be created in 'lib/myapp', with simple adapters in 
'lib/myapp/Model', using Catalyst::Model::Adaptor.

At this point, I am a little less clear on how best to structure my application.

As my models will be primarily concerned with accessing the database, how much 
database code should go in my model classes, and how much in the 
DBIx::Class::ResultSet classes?  For example, should I write a method in my 
DBIx::Class::ResultSet classes that can add new CDs when supplied with title, 
artist and a track list?  Or would it be better to put this in my model?

Data validation could be handled by HTML::FormHandler, but any validation 
performed here won't be of much use if I later provide an alternative interface 
to my application.  I assume that I should therefore delegate validation to my 
model as well, so that the same validation methods can be used no matter what 
the interface?

Are there any good tutorials out there that cover this sort of thing?  At the 
moment, I'm more interested in best practices for structuring a Catalyst 
application than in the details of the code itself.  Are there any good open 
source Catalyst applications that I can look at to help me with this?  I've had 
a look at MojoMojo, but it's a little too complicated for me at the moment.


Many thanks,

Martin