PetcliniX is an open learning initiative designed to address a recurring gap in software education: the lack of realistic, comparable, full-scale examples. Most tutorials focus on isolated concepts—one pattern, one framework, or one small example. PetcliniX aims to change that by demonstrating complete, real-world architectures side-by-side.
Rather than a single code sample or “hello world” app, PetcliniX presents the same domain problem—a veterinary clinic management system—implemented across multiple architectures, languages, and frameworks. This allows developers to compare designs directly and learn architectural trade-offs in context.
Most educational materials highlight narrow technical slices: a single feature, a single layer, or a specific technology. They rarely show how all the pieces come together in a coherent, production-scale architecture.
PetcliniX fills that gap by showing complete system implementations, from domain modeling to infrastructure, across multiple stacks.
The typical example app used in tutorials—a simple Todo List—is not enough to illustrate enterprise-level design. It lacks:
In contrast, PetcliniX uses a realistic and relatable domain with customers, pets, appointments, treatments, billing, and inventory. These complexities introduce authentic architecture decisions, similar to what real systems face.
PetcliniX allows developers to see how the same domain problem is solved with different approaches:
This comparative view helps learners build architectural judgment, not just coding skills.
To ensure fair comparison, PetcliniX uses a consistent domain model across all implementations. It has enough complexity to demonstrate architectural patterns without being overwhelming. The domain itself should be easy imagine and understand. This creates enough complexity to demonstrate design patterns like domain-driven design (DDD), transactional consistency, and modular boundaries.
The different implementations can be discovered and explored in the repository. Each implementation is executable and so many different apsects can be compared directly. The showcases show footprints of the system and the trade-offs made. There are several different cateogorties.
PetcliniX is designed for developers, architects, and educators who want to learn by comparison. The key goals are:
Each implementation includes complete domain logic, infrastructure, and user-facing workflows.
Every architecture page highlights pros, cons, and suitable contexts.
No contrived examples. All code reflects real-world challenges like data validation, concurrency, and modular growth.
Instructors and teams can use PetcliniX to demonstrate architectural evolution and best practices.
By comparing architectures side-by-side, developers learn:
PetcliniX makes these insights tangible rather than theoretical.
PetcliniX aims to become an open, community-driven reference for real-world software architecture learning. The long-term goals include:
PetcliniX bridges the gap between simple tutorials and enterprise-level reality. By showing multiple architectures applied to the same domain, it helps developers grasp the full picture of software design — not just syntax or patterns, but how systems are actually built.
If you’re tired of Todo apps and want to learn architecture through comparison, PetcliniX is your next step.