Go struct separation best practices - go

I am trying to figure out a decent approach toward dealing with multiple uses for a struct. Let me explain the scenario.
I have a struct that represents the Model in gorm. In the current implementation, I have validation bound to this struct so when a request hits the endpoint I would validate against the model's struct. This works fine for most cases. But then there are some instances where I want to have more control over the request and the response.
This is possible by introducing a few additional internal structs that will parse the request and response. And I can decouple the validation from the model into the request specific struct. I am trying to figure out what the best practice is around these patterns. Pretty sure a lot of peeps would have faced a similar situation.
// Transaction holds the transaction details.
type Transaction struct {
Program Program
ProgramID uuid.UUID
Type string
Value float64
Reference string
}
// TransactionRequest for the endpoint.
type TransactionRequest struct {
ProgramKey string `json:"program_key" validator:"required"`
Type string `json:"type" validator:"required,oneof=credit debit"`
Value float64 `json:"value" validator:"required,numeric"`
Reference string `json:"reference" validator:"required"`
}
Update:
I managed to find a balance by introducing additional tags for update requests, I wrote about how I achieved it here

I faced similar problem and for solving that, defined a method for validating and didn't use tags. I had to, because I follow DDD and we should validate in service layer not API layer.
here is a sample of my apporach:
type Station struct {
types.GormCol
CompanyID types.RowID `gorm:"not null;unique" json:"company_id,omitempty"`
CompanyName string `gorm:"not null;unique" json:"company_name,omitempty"`
NodeCode uint64 `json:"node_code,omitempty"`
NodeName string `json:"node_name,omitempty"`
Key string `gorm:"type:text" json:"key,omitempty"`
MachineID string `json:"machine_id,omitempty"`
Detail string `json:"detail,omitempty"`
Error error `sql:"-" json:"user_error,omitempty"`
Extra map[string]interface{} `sql:"-" json:"extra_station,omitempty"`
}
// Validate check the type of
func (p *Station) Validate(act action.Action) error {
fieldError := core.NewFieldError(term.Error_in_companys_form)
switch act {
case action.Save:
if p.CompanyName == "" {
fieldError.Add(term.V_is_required, "Company Name", "company_name")
}
if p.CompanyID == 0 {
fieldError.Add(term.V_is_required, "Company ID", "company_id")
}
}
if fieldError.HasError() {
return fieldError
}
return nil
}
file's address: https://github.com/syronz/sigma-mono/blob/master/model/station.model.go

Related

Mapping one type to another

Let's say I have the following types.
type Contract struct {
Id string `json:"id" gorm:"column:uuid"`
Name string `json:"name" gorm:"column:name"`
Description string `json:"descr" gorm:"column:descr"`
ContractTypeId int `json:"contract_type_id" gorm:"column:contract_type_id"`
}
type ContractModel struct {
Id string `json:"id" gorm:"column:uuid"`
Name string `json:"name" gorm:"column:name"`
Description string `json:"descr" gorm:"column:descr"`
}
I have a SQL query using gorm to scan results into a contract object.
How can I map the values from the contract object into contractModel object?
I tried using the package go-automapper as such:
automapper.Map(contract, ContractModel{})
I want to drop the ContractTypeId.
Can I do this for multiple types in a list?
var contractModels []ContractModel
automapper.Map(contracts, &contractModels)
You can do either:
models := []ContractModel{}
automapper.Map(contracts, &models)
Or call automapper.Map in a loop:
models := make([]ContractModel, len(contracts))
for i := range contracts {
automapper.Map(contracts[i], &models[i])
}
You should be aware that automapper uses reflection behind the scenes and thus is much slower than straight forward non-polymorphic copying like #ThinkGoodly suggests. It's a totally fine solution if performance isn't top priority though.

How to change binding of required tag for different endpoints in Golang (Gin)?

TL;DR
I'm looking for way to to get rid of the binding:"required" tag for specific endpoints (such as PUT) in Gin govalidate.
Issue
For the POST route, the password to create a new user is required.
For the PUT route, the password is not required, but still needs to be alphanumeric and a minimum of 8 characters.
Tried
Using different packages to see if I can change the binding when the endpoint is hit.
Created another struct called UserUpdate but feel this is really messy, particularly when the struct is large.
Using an embedded struct with such as below, however this couldn't be converted to the type User (I'm not sure if this is possible)
type User struct {
Password string `db:"password" json:"password,omitempty" "binding:min=8,alpha"
User
}
Example
// User Struct
type User struct {
Id int `db:"id" json:"id"`
FirstName string `db:"first_name" json:"first_name" binding:"required"`
LastName string `db:"last_name" json:"last_name" binding:"required"`
Password string `db:"password" json:"password,omitempty" "binding:required,min=8,alpha"`
}
// Update in Controller
func (c *UserController) Update(g *gin.Context) {
// Change from binding to nothing here!
var u domain.User
if err := g.ShouldBindJSON(&u); err != nil {
Respond(g, 400, "Validation failed", err)
return
}
}
I feel there must be something cleaner to tackle this problem!
Here is something similar, but doesn't quite answer the issue:
golang - elegant way to omit a json property from being serialized

How to omit some parameters of structure Gin gonic

I have big structure with more than 50 params
type Application struct {
Id int64 `json:"id"`
FullName string `json:"fullName,omitempty"`
ActualAddress string `json:"actualAddress,omitempty"`
.....
}
I use gin-gonic and when I return application I need to omit some params I've created a function which makes empty some params (playLink) and then gin returns me correct json (without unnecessary values). I heard that reflection isn't fast operation so in our case we can use a lot of ugly if-else or switch-cases. Is there any other solutions faster than reflecting and more beautiful than if-elses?
The thing is that structure params have non-empty values, so they wont by omitted by gin. That's why I've created function to make some params empty before return
The thing is, if you only want to zero a few fields, it's more readable to do it without a function, e.g.
app := Application{}
app.FullName, app.ActualAddress = "", ""
If you want to create a function for it, at least use variadic parameter, so it's easier to call it:
func zeroFields(application *Application, fields ...string) {
// ...
}
So then calling it:
zeroFields(&app, "FullName", "ActualAddress")
Yes, this will have to use reflection, so it's slower than it could be, and error prone (mistyped names can only be detected at runtime). If you want to avoid using reflection, pass the address of the fields:
func zeroFields(ps ...*string) {
for _, p := range ps {
*p = ""
}
}
This way you have compile-time guarantee that you type field names correctly, and that they have string type.
Calling it:
zeroFields(&application.FullName, &application.ActualAddress)
Try it on the Go Playground.
If I understand correctly: you want to return some values from your struct but not all of them? Perhaps a nested struct?
type Application struct {
ID struct {
ID int64 `json:"id"`
} `json:"id"`
Person struct {
Fullname string `json:"Fullname"
} `json:"person"
}
That should let you filter out the fields you want to use.

Handling optional boolean values

I'm failing to understand how I can work around the problem I'm experiencing in my own application.
Imagine this example of a struct that models an incoming request and a function that puts the fields from that request into a database.
type NewBooleanRequest struct {
RequiredString string `json:"requiredString"`
OptionalBoolean bool `json:"maybeBoolean"`
}
func LogBooleanRequest(req NewBooleanRequest, db *sql.DB) {
db.Exec("INSERT INTO log (booleanValue, stringValue) VALUES ($1, $2)", req.OptionalBoolean, req.RequiredString)
}
Now this obviously works fine if I know I will be given a value for all fields of my request model, but that's not a common requirement in reality. How do people generally model "optional" semantics for bool values given that bool has a zero value that is valid in essentially all contexts?
This question isn't specific to booleans, it's common for all NULLable types. The simplest solution is to use a pointer (*bool in your example). There are also Nullable values for common types provided by the sql package. sql.NullBool would be the one you want in this case.
Beside the accepted answer, I found this interesting library https://github.com/guregu/null that can deal with nullable value pretty well. It's very useful to declare API request params without messing with sql library on the server routing (which is not so relevant).
For your case, you can write your request like:
type NewBooleanRequest struct {
RequiredString string `json:"requiredString"`
OptionalBoolean null.Bool `json:"maybeBoolean"`
}
request := NewBooleanRequest {
RequiredString: "Your string",
OptionalBoolean: null.BoolFrom(false)
}
if request.OptionalBoolean.Valid {
fmt.Println(request.OptionalBoolean.Bool) // Print "false"
} else {
fmt.Println("request.OptionalBoolean is NULL")
}

Subtypes Supertypes in go

Coming from OOP paradigms and porting a code from an OOP language, I come across a problem now which is solved in OOP via abstraction so I'm wondering how can I approach the following problem in Go which follows composition instead of inheritance.
In this scenario my ValueObjects (DTO, POJO etc.) are composed of other ValueObjects. I'm populating them through web service calls that returns json so basically my functions/method calls are common for all types and subtypes.
My super type EntityVO
type EntityVO struct {
EntityName string
EntityType string
PublicationId string
Version string
}
A subtype 1 composed with EntityVO
type ArticleVO struct {
EntityVO
ContentSize string
Created string
}
subtype 2 composed with EntityVO with it's own unique set of fields
type CollectionVO struct {
EntityVO
ProductId string
Position string
}
I'm calling web services to retrieve data and populate these VOs.
Earlier I had one function to call the web service and populate the data but now I'm duplicating the code for each VO.
type Article struct{}
func (a *Article) RequestList(articleVO *valueObject.ArticleVO) (*valueObject.ArticleVO, error) {
// some code
}
Duplicating the same code but changing the signature.
type Collection struct{}
func (c * Collection) RequestList(collectionVO *valueObject.CollectionVO) (*valueObject.ArticleVO, error) {
// some code - duplicate same as above except method signature
}
and I've several entities and just because my VO's are different I'm forced to duplicate the code and cater to each type of VO I've. In OOP sub types can be passed to a function accepting super types but not in go, so wondering how it should be done so I don't end up duplicated code that's different in signature only?
Any advice for a better approach in this kind of scenario?
This is where golang interfaces can shine.
It's worth noting, however, that it's difficult to write subclass/inheritance code in golang. We'd prefer thinking of it as composition.
type EntityVO interface {
GetName() string
SetName(string) error
GetType() string
...
}
type EntityVOImpl struct {
EntityName string
EntityType string
PublicationId string
Version string
}
func (e EntityVOImpl) GetName() string {
return e.EntityName
}
...
type ArticleVOImpl struct {
EntityVOImpl
ContentSize string
Created string
}
type CollectionVOImpl struct {
EntityVO
ProductId string
Position string
}
// CODE
func (e *Entity) RequestList(entityVO valueObject.EntityVO) (valueObject.EntityVO, error) {
// some code
}
In addition, as long as your interface files are shared, I don't think there should by any problem sending/marshalling/unmarshalling the structs over the wire.
The second parameter of json.Unmarshal is a "universal" interface{} type. I think similar approach is applicable to your case.
Define data type for storing web service properties which may differ for each entity, e.g.
type ServiceDescriptor struct {
URI string
//other field/properties...
}
Function for populating the entity may look like
func RequestList(desc *ServiceDescriptor, v interface{}) error {
//Retrieve json data from web service
//some code
return json.Unmarshal(data, v)
}
You can call the function to populate different type of entities, e.g.
desc := &ServiceDescriptor{}
article := ArticleVO{}
desc.URI = "article.uri"
//...
//You must pass pointer to entity for 2nd param
RequestList(desc, &article)
collection := CollectionVO{}
desc.URI = "collection.uri"
//...
//You must pass pointer to entity for 2nd param
RequestList(desc, &collection)

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