Relation between command handlers, aggregates, the repository and the event store in CQRS

Question

I'd like to understand some details of the relations between command handlers, aggregates, the repository and the event store in CQRS-based systems.

What I've understood so far:

• Command handlers receive commands from the bus. They are responsible for loading the appropriate aggregate from the repository and call the domain logic on the aggregate. Once finished, they remove the command from the bus.
• An aggregate provides behavior and an internal state. State is never public. The only way to change state is by using the behavior. The methods that model this behavior create events from the command's properties, and apply these events to the aggregate, which in turn call an event handlers that sets the internal state accordingly.
• The repository simply allows loading aggregates on a given ID, and adding new aggregates. Basically, the repository connects the domain to the event store.
• The event store, last but not least, is responsible for storing events to a database (or whatever storage is used), and reloading these events as a so-called event stream.

So far, so good. Now there are some issues that I did not yet get:

• If a command handler is to call behavior on a yet existing aggregate, everything is quite easy. The command handler gets a reference to the repository, calls its loadById method and the aggregate is returned. But what does the command handler do when there is no aggregate yet, but one should be created? From my understanding the aggregate should later-on be rebuilt using the events. This means that creation of the aggregate is done in reply to a fooCreated event. But to be able to store any event (including the fooCreated one), I need an aggregate. So this looks to me like a chicken-and-egg problem: I can not create the aggregate without the event, but the only component that should create events is the aggregate. So basically it comes down to: How do I create new aggregates, who does what?
• When an aggregate triggers an event, an internal event handler responses to it (typically by being called via an apply method) and changes the aggregate's state. How is this event handed over to the repository? Who originates the "please send the new events to the repository / event store" action? The aggregate itself? The repository by watching the aggregate? Someone else who is subscribed to the internal events? ...?
• Last but not least I have a problem understanding the concept of an event stream correctly: In my imagination, it's simply something like an ordered list of events. What's of importance is that it's "ordered". Is this right?

Answer 1

The following is based on my own experience and my experiments with various frameworks like Lokad.CQRS, NCQRS, etc. I'm sure there are multiple ways to handle this. I'll post what makes most sense to me.

1. Aggregate Creation:

Every time a command handler needs an aggregate, it uses a repository. The repository retrieves the respective list of events from the event store and calls an overloaded constructor, injecting the events

var stream = eventStore.LoadStream(id)
var User = new User(stream)

If the aggregate didn't exist before, the stream will be empty and the newly created object will be in it's original state. You might want to make sure that in this state only a few commands are allowed to bring the aggregate to life, e.g. User.Create().

2. Storage of new Events

Command handling happens inside a Unit of Work. During command execution every resulting event will be added to a list inside the aggregate (User.Changes). Once execution is finished, the changes will be appended to the event store. In the example below this happens in the following line:

store.AppendToStream(cmd.UserId, stream.Version, user.Changes)

3. Order of Events

Just imagine what would happen, if two subsequent CustomerMoved events are replayed in the wrong order.

An Example

I'll try to illustrate the with a piece of pseudo-code (I deliberately left repository concerns inside the command handler to show what would happen behind the scenes):

Application Service:

UserCommandHandler
    Handle(CreateUser cmd)
        stream = store.LoadStream(cmd.UserId)
        user = new User(stream.Events)
        user.Create(cmd.UserName, ...)
        store.AppendToStream(cmd.UserId, stream.Version, user.Changes)

    Handle(BlockUser cmd)
        stream = store.LoadStream(cmd.UserId)
        user = new User(stream.Events)
        user.Block(string reason)
        store.AppendToStream(cmd.UserId, stream.Version, user.Changes)

Aggregate:

User
    created = false
    blocked = false

    Changes = new List<Event>

    ctor(eventStream)
        isNewEvent = false
        foreach (event in eventStream)
            this.Apply(event, isNewEvent)

    Create(userName, ...)
        if (this.created) throw "User already exists"
        isNewEvent = true
        this.Apply(new UserCreated(...), isNewEvent)

    Block(reason)
        if (!this.created) throw "No such user"
        if (this.blocked) throw "User is already blocked"
        isNewEvent = true
        this.Apply(new UserBlocked(...), isNewEvent)

    Apply(userCreatedEvent, isNewEvent)
        this.created = true
        if (isNewEvent) this.Changes.Add(userCreatedEvent)

    Apply(userBlockedEvent, isNewEvent)
        this.blocked = true
        if (isNewEvent) this.Changes.Add(userBlockedEvent)

Update:

As a side note: Yves' answer reminded me of an interesting article by Udi Dahan from a couple of years ago:

• Don’t Create Aggregate Roots

Answer 2

A small variation on Dennis excellent answer:

• When dealing with "creational" use cases (i.e. that should spin off new aggregates), try to find another aggregate or factory you can move that responsibility to. This does not conflict with having a ctor that takes events to hydrate (or any other mechanism to rehydrate for that matter). Sometimes the factory is just a static method (good for "context"/"intent" capturing), sometimes it's an instance method of another aggregate (good place for "data" inheritance), sometimes it's an explicit factory object (good place for "complex" creation logic).
• I like to provide an explicit GetChanges() method on my aggregate that returns the internal list as an array. If my aggregate is to stay in memory beyond one execution, I also add an AcceptChanges() method to indicate the internal list should be cleared (typically called after things were flushed to the event store). You can use either a pull (GetChanges/Changes) or push (think .net event or IObservable) based model here. Much depends on the transactional semantics, tech, needs, etc ...
• Your eventstream is a linked list. Each revision (event/changeset) pointing to the previous one (a.k.a. the parent). Your eventstream is a sequence of events/changes that happened to a specific aggregate. The order is only to be guaranteed within the aggregate boundary.

Answer 3

I almost agree with yves-reynhout and dennis-traub but I want to show you how I do this. I want to strip my aggregates of the responsibility to apply the events on themselves or to re-hydrate themselves; otherwise there is a lot of code duplication: every aggregate constructor will look the same:

UserAggregate:
    ctor(eventStream)
         foreach (event in eventStream)
            this.Apply(event)


OrderAggregate:
    ctor(eventStream)
         foreach (event in eventStream)
            this.Apply(event)


ProfileAggregate:
    ctor(eventStream)
         foreach (event in eventStream)
            this.Apply(event)

Those responsibilities could be left to the command dispatcher. The command is handled directly by the aggregate.

Command dispatcher class

    dispatchCommand(command) method:
        newEvents = ConcurentProofFunctionCaller.executeFunctionUntilSucceeds(tryToDispatchCommand)
        EventDispatcher.dispatchEvents(newEvents)

    tryToDispatchCommand(command) method:
        aggregateClass = CommandSubscriber.getAggregateClassForCommand(command)
        aggregate = AggregateRepository.loadAggregate(aggregateClass, command.getAggregateId())
        newEvents = CommandApplier.applyCommandOnAggregate(aggregate, command)
        AggregateRepository.saveAggregate(command.getAggregateId(), aggregate, newEvents)

ConcurentProofFunctionCaller class

    executeFunctionUntilSucceeds(pureFunction) method:
        do this n times
            try
                call result=pureFunction()
                return result
            catch(ConcurentWriteException)
                continue
        throw TooManyRetries    

AggregateRepository class

     loadAggregate(aggregateClass, aggregateId) method:
         aggregate = new aggregateClass
         priorEvents = EventStore.loadEvents()
         this.applyEventsOnAggregate(aggregate, priorEvents)

     saveAggregate(aggregateId, aggregate, newEvents)
        this.applyEventsOnAggregate(aggregate, newEvents)
        EventStore.saveEventsForAggregate(aggregateId, newEvents, priorEvents.version)

SomeAggregate class
    handleCommand1(command1) method:
        return new SomeEvent or throw someException BUT don't change state!
    applySomeEvent(SomeEvent) method:
        changeStateSomehow() and not throw any exception and don't return anything!

Keep in mind that this is pseudo code projected from a PHP application; the real code should have things injected and other responsibilities refactored out in other classes. The ideea is to keep aggregates as clean as possible and avoid code duplication.

Some important aspects about aggregates:

1. command handlers should not change state; they yield events or throw exceptions
2. event applies should not throw any exception and should not return anything; they only change internal state

An open-source PHP implementation of this could be found here.