______
 |  ____|
 | |__    __   __   __ _   _ __    ___
 |  __|   \ \ / /  / _. | | '_ \  / __|
 | |____   \ V /  | (_| | | | | | \__ \
 |______|   \_/    \__,_| |_| |_| |___/

 more expressive universal gRPC client

---

Motivation

Evans was created to use easier than other existing gRPC clients.
If you want to keep your product quality, you must use CI with gRPC testing, should not do use manually testing.
Evans will complete your other usecases just like:

• to automate some tasks by scripting
• manullary gRPC API inspection

above usecases is corresponding to Evans's two modes, command-line mode and REPL mode.

command-line mode

command-line mode is stateless mode just like grpc-ecosystem/polyglot.
command-line mode issue one request per one command as its name suggests.
So it is based on UNIX philosophy.

For example, read inputs from stdin, the command will be a filter command.
On the other hand, the command result will be outputted to stdout by JSON formatted.
So, you can format it by any commands like jq.

$ echo '{ "name": "ktr" }' | evans --package hello --service Greeter --call SayHello hello.proto | jq -r '.message'
# hello, ktr!

Also, if you want to use same command (e.g. use same JSON inputs), you can use --file (-f) option.

$ cat hello.json
{
  "name": "ktr"
}

$ evans -f hello.json --package hello --service Greeter --call SayHello hello.proto | jq -r '.message'
# hello, ktr!

By the way, command-line mode is not able to omit --package, --service and --call option unlike REPL mode.
However, if .evans.toml is exist in Git project root, you can denote default values.

[default]
package = "hello"
service = "Greeter"

Then, command will be more clearly.

$ evans -f hello.json --call SayHello hello.proto

REPL mode

REPL mode is the solution for second usecase.
You can use it without thinking like package name, service name, RPC name, command usage, and so on because REPL mode has powerful completion!

Actual demonstration:

proto file which read in demonstration is:

syntax = "proto3";

package helloworld;

service Greeter {
  rpc SayHello (HelloRequest) returns (HelloResponse) {}
}

enum Language {
  ENGLISH = 0;
  JAPANESE = 1;
}

message Person {
  string name = 1;
  repeated string others = 2;
}

message HelloRequest {
  Person person = 1;
  Language language = 2;
}

message HelloResponse {
  string message = 1;
}

implementation of the server is:

package main

import (
    "fmt"
    "log"
    "net"
    "strings"

    "golang.org/x/net/context"

    helloworld "github.com/ktr0731/evans/tmp"
    "google.golang.org/grpc"
)

type Greeter struct{}

func (t *Greeter) SayHello(ctx context.Context, req *helloworld.HelloRequest) (*helloworld.HelloResponse, error) {
    msg := "Hello, %s also %s!"
    if req.GetLanguage() == helloworld.Language_JAPANESE {
        msg = "こんにちは、%s と %s ！"
    }
    return &helloworld.HelloResponse{
        Message: fmt.Sprintf(msg, req.GetPerson().GetName(), strings.Join(req.GetPerson().GetOthers(), ", ")),
    }, nil
}

func main() {
    l, err := net.Listen("tcp", "localhost:50051")
    if err != nil {
        log.Fatal(err)
    }

    server := grpc.NewServer()
    helloworld.RegisterGreeterServer(server, &Greeter{})
    if err := server.Serve(l); err != nil {
        log.Fatal(err)
    }
}

Installation

from binary

please see GitHub Releases.

macOS

$ brew tap ktr0731/evans
$ brew install evans

go get

$ go get github.com/ktr0731/evans

Usage

Evans consists of some commands in REPL.

Enter to REPL (this file is here)

$ evans testdata/proto/helloworld/helloworld.proto

To show summary of packages, services or messages of proto files REPL read:

> show package
+------------+
|  PACKAGE   |
+------------+
| helloworld |
+------------+

> show service
+---------+----------+--------------+--------------+
| SERVICE |   RPC    | REQUESTTYPE  | RESPONSETYPE |
+---------+----------+--------------+--------------+
| Greeter | SayHello | HelloRequest | HelloReply   |
+---------+----------+--------------+--------------+

> show message
+--------------+
|   MESSAGE    |
+--------------+
| HelloRequest |
| HelloReply   |
+--------------+

To show more description of message:

> desc HelloRequest
+-------+-------------+
| FIELD |    TYPE     |
+-------+-------------+
| name  | TYPE_STRING |
+-------+-------------+

Call a RPC:

> call SayHello
name (TYPE_STRING) = ktr
{
  "message": "Hello ktr"
}

Evans constructs a gRPC request interactively and send the request to gRPC server.
Finally, Evans prints the JSON formatted result.

Supported IDL (interface definition language)

• ProtocolBuffers

See Also

Evans (DJ YOSHITAKA)

iTunes