datomic-helpers

Helpers for declaring Datomic schema.

Rationale

Datomic schema is a list of facts defined as Clojure data, which is great. But Datomic doesn't tell how to organize DB schema. The simplest option would be defining a single list of database objects. That is fine for small schemas. But when schema grows, it becomes hard to manage and validate it:

while developing, you may want to turn on/off some attribute definitions
text editors don't like huge Clojure forms

Also, it's better to ensure that

all the schema entities have unique names
DB functions are syntactically correct and don't refer undefined symbols

datomic-helpers is an attempt to solve the problems above adding some convenience to defining Datomic database schemas.

Usage

Add dependency

[suprematic/datomic-helpers "0.1.0-SNAPSHOT"]

Require datomic-helpers.schema

(ns my.app.store-db
  (:require [datomic-helpers.schema as dschema
             :refer [defschema db-fn defidents]]))

Examples

Define identities

;; defidents creates a list or identity definitions and binds it to a var
(defidents colors
  :color/red
  :color/yellow
  :color/blue
  :color/green
  :color/black)

Define attributes

;; defschema creates a list or attribute definitions and binds it to a var
(defschema pen
  {:db/ident :pen/ink-color
   :db/valueType :db.type/ref
   :db/cardinality :db.cardinality/one
   :db/doc "The ink color"}

  {:db/ident :pen/cap-color
   :db/valueType :db.type/ref
   :db/cardinality :db.cardinality/one
   :db/doc "The cap color"})

(defschema pencil
  {:db/ident :pencil/core-color
   :db/valueType :db.type/ref
   :db/cardinality :db.cardinality/one
   :db/doc "The ink color"}

  {:db/ident :pencil/body-color
   :db/valueType :db.type/ref
   :db/cardinality :db.cardinality/one
   :db/doc "The cap color"})

Define DB functions

;; Internal checks

;; db-fn also defines a function which can be used e.g., in REPL
(db-fn -check-pen-attributes [_db pen]
  (when-not (contains? pen :pen/ink-color)
    (throw (ex-info "no ink color" {:pen pen})))
  (when-not (contains? pen :pen/cap-color)
    (throw (ex-info "no cap color" {:pen pen}))))


(db-fn -check-pencil-attributes [_db pencil]
  (when-not (contains? pencil :pencil/core-color)
    (throw (ex-info "no core color" {:pencil pencil})))
  (when-not (contains? pencil :pencil/body-color)
    (throw (ex-info "no body color" {:pencil pencil}))))

;; API

(db-fn add-pen [_db pen]
  [[:-check-pen-attributes pen]
   pen])

(db-fn add-pencil [_db pencil]
  [[:-check-pencil-attributes pencil]
   pencil])

Collect the final schema, checking if all the definitions are unique

(def schema
  (dschema/collect-schema))

Write the schema and use the DB

(ns my.app
  (:require [datomic.api :as datomic]
            [my.app.store-db :as store-db]))

(let [db-conn (datomic/connect db-url)]
  @(datomic/transact db-conn store-db/schema))
  
(let [pen
      {:pen/ink-color :color/blue
       :pen/cap-color :color/black}
      pencil
      {:pencil/core-color :color/yellow
       :pencil/body-color :color/yellow}
      db-conn (datomic/connect db-url)]
  @(datomic/transact db-conn [[:add-pen pen]])
  @(datomic/transact db-conn [[:add-pencil pencil]]))

License

This library and the accompanying materials are made available under the terms of the Eclipse Public License 2.0 which is available at eclipse.org.

This Source Code may also be made available under the following Secondary Licenses when the conditions for such availability set forth in the Eclipse Public License, v. 2.0 are satisfied: GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version, with the GNU Classpath Exception which is available at gnu.org.