test-grpc

test-grpc

Just to try out gRPC in Go

Setup

• Install Go
• Install proto compiler plugin for Go and grpc

  go install google.golang.org/protobuf/cmd/protoc-gen-go@v1.28
  go install google.golang.org/grpc/cmd/protoc-gen-go-grpc@v1.2
  

• Set the binary installed directory in path for protoc to find it. Run export PATH="$PATH:$(go env GOPATH)/bin" or add it to ~/.bash_profile`
• To test, run server by go run server.go and client by go run client.go
• Warning: the module contains two main methods in main package i.e. one in server.go and other in client.go, which might give warning but should be fine as this is a test project and client and server are running seperately.

Notes

• gRPC service and request response format are defined in protos/service.proto.
• *.proto file is used to generate request response struct for Go client and server along with interface for service rpc methods in *.pb.go and *_grpc.pb.go file respectively.
• To generate the Go files:

  protoc --go_out=. --go_opt=paths=source_relative \
  --go-grpc_out=. --go-grpc_opt=paths=source_relative protos/service.proto
  

• --go_out tells proto compiler to generate Go structs (*.pb.go) which depend on plugin protoc-gen-go.
• --go-grpc_out tells the protoc to generate Go client code and service interface (*_grpc.pb.go) using another plugin protoc-gen-go-grpc.
• Once the code is generated, server can implement the service interface using the structs defined in .pb.go file and start to listen on a port.
• Similarly, client can connect to the server using client defined in _grpc.pb.go file to call the service methods and use the request and response structs defined in .pb.go files.

References

• https://grpc.io/docs/languages/go/quickstart/
• https://grpc.io/docs/languages/go/basics/