Domain Expert: "Our flow is simple: A website visitor buys a ticket to become a customer. When they arrive, we check them in and they become an attendee."
You (to yourself): 'Visitor, Customer, Attendee'... those are all just users. "That's easy enough, let me make the change real quick: public class User { ... }"

In that split second, the assumption is cemented into the codebase. Slowly, an invisible wall of assumptions gets built - brick by brick. While these translations seem innocent at first, the wall creates a structural instability that can tear whole projects into pieces over time.

This session is about tearing down that wall. We will clear the debris to reveal a foundation of shared understanding and clarity.

On this foundation, we will build a highway bridge over the communication gap using our Clean Modeling Playbook. This holistic approach connects requirements directly to your code using two core blocks: Exquisite Listening to capture exact terminology, and Clean Language - an assumption-free inquiry method - to reveal the underlying structure of the domain model.

In this practice-focused talk, we apply the playbook to a conference registration system, exploring the distinct concepts of Visitors, Customers, and Attendees. We will trace these refined requirements into the code structure, demonstrating how to write code that is a true reflection of the business domain.

This talk was presented at AxonIQ Conference 2025. A recording is available on YouTube.