This project is a sample application made using the Go-Kit library and patterns.
Many of the current examples out there are (understandably) simplistic in terms of business logic and include all possible Go-Kit options. This sample aims to be a little more selective and opinionated while producing a service that could theoretically be used in a production environment.
- Elegant Monolith: This app is designed as an elegant monolith, or a collection of related services packaged as a single deployable unit. The elegance comes from the lack of service coupling and strong service contracts allowing functionality to be broken out as needed based on scaling, organizational needs, etc. with minimal effort.
- Protobuf: Protocol buffers are used as a common data structure definition throughout the application, not just in Go-Kit's transport layer as is done in most Go-Kit examples. This reduces (but doesn't eliminate) the need to continuously map between data transfer objects at each layer of the application. A common data structure definition also allows us to have a common domain definition when talking about what an entity is across the organization (a User, is a User, is a User).
- HTTP/gRPC: HTTP and gRPC will be simultaneously supported. gRPC has plenty of benefits over a standard RESTful API, but also introduces some additional challenges in certain areas (edge communication (browser/mobile), developer workflows, etc.) and is an additional hurdle for teams who have traditionally worked exclusively in REST and JSON. By using Protocol Buffer defined messages throughout the app, including a gRPC transport layer is very little effort and allows teams to transition to the protocol when they're comfortable and when the benefits become clear.
- Operational Concerns: Addressing config, database migrations, deployment, etc. are explicitly listed as anti-goals of the Go-Kit project and are therefore not present in most examples, this app intentionally includes these elements. Including these operational concerns obviously binds it to certain libraries and tools.