I followed you up to a point. 1) I didn't have modules in my layout. But given the size of this project it makes sense so I reorganized my folder structure to use models (this alone may make organization much easier the more I think about it)
2) I had to add a $paths[] = $moduleDir; so that I could access forms 3) $row = Project::getModel('Acl/Users')->fetchRow($user->select()->where('user_name = ?', $form->getValue('username'))); Returns an error: Fatal error: Call to a member function fetchRow() on a non-object in C:\wamp\www\el-cel\application\modules\User\controllers\IndexController.php on line 126 My layout was (in part) - application - - modules - - - user - - - - models - - - - - acl - - - - - - users.php