github.com/kosatnkn/catalyst/v2

Catalyst

Catalyst started out as a microservice base that can be used to create REST APIs. It contains many features that are essential, such as.

• Configurability
• A basic dependency injection mechanism
• HTTP request, response cycle handling
• Structure and field validations
• Error handling
• Logging
• Database resource management
• Application metrics

Written in Go using the Clean Architecture paradigm it offers clean separation between business (domain) logic and facilitation logic.

Creating a New Project Using Catalyst

A new project can be created in one of two ways.

Use Cauldron

The easiest way to create a project using Catalyst as the base is to use Cauldron.

Cauldron is a project generation tool that creates new projects using Catalyst as the base.

More information about Cauldron can be found here

Begin by installing Cauldron.

go get github.com/kosatnkn/cauldron

Command

cauldron -n Sample -s github.com/username [-t v1.0.0]

cauldron --name Sample --namespace github.com/username [--tag v1.0.0]

Input Parameters

• -n --name Project name (ex: Sample). The name will be converted to lowercase to be used in module path.
• -s --namespace Namespace for the project (ex: github.com/username)
• -t --tag Release version of Catalyst to be used. The latest version will be used if -t is not provided
• -h --help Show help message

This will create a new project with go.mod module path of github.com/username/sample

Cauldron will do a git init on the newly created project but you will have to stage all the files and do the first commit yourself.

git add .

git commit -m "first commit"

Cloning

This is the work intensive approach.

Clone Catalyst

git clone https://github.com/kosatnkn/catalyst.git <new_project_name>

Remove .git

cd <new_project_name>

rm -rf .git

Change import paths

NOTE: Since Catalyst uses go mod the the newly created application will still work. But all the import paths would be as in Catalyst base project which is not what you will want.

• First change the module name in the go.mod file to a module name of your choice
• Then do a Find & Replace in the entire project to update all the import paths
• You may also need to change the splash text in app/splash/styles.go
• Now run and see whether the project compiles and run properly
• If so you can do a git init to the project

Configurations

Configuration files for a Catalyst project can be found in configs directory.

Initially you will have a set of config files with the extension of .yaml.example. You can create .yaml configuration files using these example files as a template.

The Sample Set

We have included a sample set of endpoints and their corresponding controller and domain logic by default.

This is to make it easier for you to follow through and understand how Catalyst handles the request response cycle for a given request.

The sample set will cover all basic CRUD operations that a REST API will normally need.

There is also an openapi.yaml file in doc/api directory that corresponds to the set of Sample APIs that are implemented.

In the context of Catalyst we use a concept called Transport mediums to define ways in which you can communicate with the microservice.

A package inside the transport directory consists of all the logic needed to handle communication with the outside world using one type of transport medium.

Out of the box, Catalyst contain two such transport mediums.

• http (to handle REST web requests)
• metrics (to expose application metrics)

What makes Catalyst a REST API is this http package which handles the complete lifecycle of REST web requests.

http Transport Medium

REST API is implemented in this package.

Following is the request, response cycle executed when a request comes to a REST endpoint.

                               + ------- +           + -------- +
                               | REQUEST |           | RESPONSE |
                               + ------- +           + -------- +
                                   ||                     /\
                                   \/                     ||
                            + ------------ +              ||
                            |  Middleware  |              ||
                            + ------------ +              ||
                                   ||                     ||
                                   \/                     ||
                            + ------------ +              ||  
                            |    Router    |              ||    
                            + ------------ +              ||  
                                       ||                 ||
                                       ||                 ||
                                       ||   + --------------------------- +
                                       ||   | Transformer | Error Handler |
                                       ||   + --------------------------- +
                                       ||    /\
                                       \/    ||
    + -------------------- +  =>  + -------------- +  
    | Unpacker | Validator |      |   Controller   |      
    + -------------------- +  <=  + -------------- +    
                                      ||       /\
                                      \/       ||
                                  + -------------- +
                                  |    Use Case    |
                                  + -------------- +
                                      ||       /\
                                      \/       ||
                          _____________________________________
                              + ---------- +    + ------- +
                              | Repository |    | Service |
                              + ---------- +    + ------- +
                                ||    /\          ||  /\
                                \/    ||          \/  ||
                              + ---------- +    + ------- +
                              |  Database  |    |   APIs  |
                              + ---------- +    + ------- +

metrics Transport Medium

Likewise the metrics transport medium exposes an endpoint to let Prometheus scrape application metrics.

Extending the Microservice

You can add other transport mediums to leverage a project based on Catalyst.

For an example a stream package can be added to transport to communicate with a streaming platform like Kafka, or an mqtt package can be added to communicate with IoT devices.

View GoDoc Locally

godoc -http=:6060 -v

Navigate to http://localhost:6060/pkg/github.com/kosatnkn/catalyst/v2

Using Go mod

Go mod is used as the dependency management mechanism. Visit here for more details.

Some commonly used go mod commands for quick reference.

Use go mod in projects that are within the GOPATH

export GO111MODULE=on

Initialize go mod

go mod init github.com/my/repo

View final versions that will be used in a build for all direct and indirect dependencies

go list -m all

View available minor and patch upgrades for all direct and indirect dependencies

go list -u -m all

Update all direct and indirect dependencies to latest minor or patch upgrades (pre-releases are ignored)

go get -u or go get -u=patch

Build or test all packages in the module when run from the module root directory

go build ./... or go test ./...

Prune any no-longer-needed dependencies from go.mod and add any dependencies needed for other combinations of OS, architecture, and build tags

go mod tidy

Optional step to create a vendor directory

go mod vendor

Testing

To run test and output coverage report

go test -covermode=count -coverprofile=cover.out ./...

To get coverage as a percentage of overall codebase use -coverpkg=./...

go test -covermode=count -coverpkg=./... -coverprofile=cover.out ./...

Docker

Catalyst provides a basic multistage Dockerfile so you have a starting point for creating Docker images.

docker build -t <tag_name>:<tag_version> .

NOTE: Do not forget the tailing . that indicates the current directory

Example

docker build -t kosatnkn/catalyst:1.0.0 .

You can use it as follows

docker run -it --rm --name catalyst -p 3000:3000 -p 3001:3001 kosatnkn/catalyst:1.0.0

Do both in one go

docker build -t kosatnkn/catalyst:1.0.0 . && docker run -it --rm --name catalyst -p 3000:3000 -p 3001:3001 kosatnkn/catalyst:1.0.0

Wiki

Wiki pages on technical aspects of the project can be found here

NOTE: Wiki is currently being updated.