How to use golang viper Watchconfig & onConfigChange - go

Question

I am trying to read my application configuration using golang viper and would like to read the latest config always. Please find my code below
config.go
package config
import (
"github.com/spf13/viper"
"log"
"github.com/fsnotify/fsnotify"
"time"
)
type Reader interface {
GetAllKeys() []string
Get(key string) interface{}
GetBool(key string) bool
GetString(key string) string
}
type viperConfigReader struct {
viper *viper.Viper
}
var TestConfReader *viperConfigReader
func (v viperConfigReader) GetAllKeys() []string{
return v.viper.AllKeys()
}
func (v viperConfigReader) Get(key string) interface{} {
return v.viper.Get(key)
}
func (v viperConfigReader) GetBool(key string) bool {
return v.viper.GetBool(key)
}
func (v viperConfigReader) GetString(key string) string {
return v.viper.GetString(key)
}
func init() {
v:= viper.New()
v.SetConfigName("test")
v.AddConfigPath("/tmp/")
err := v.ReadInConfig()
if err != nil {
log.Panic("Not able to read configuration", err.Error())
}
TestConfReader = &viperConfigReader{
viper: v,
}
go func() {
for {
time.Sleep(time.Second * 5)
v.WatchConfig()
v.OnConfigChange(func(e fsnotify.Event) {
log.Println("config file changed", e.Name)
})
}
}()
}
main.go
package main
import (
"github.com/xxxx/xxxx/config"
"log"
"time"
)
func main() {
conf := config.TestConfReader
log.Println(conf.GetAllKeys())
log.Println(conf.GetString("test1"))
time.Sleep(20 * time.Second)
log.Println(conf.GetString("test1"))
}
When the main program is running, I tried to update the config and expected to see OnConfigChange log message but it never showed up.
How can I fix this program ?.
Can someone provide an example of using viper watchconfig & onconfigchange methods to read the latest config

Answer 1

The comment by ymonad is on the right track, depending on your OS you may be experiencing problems with viper/fsnotify.
For example, I ran your example code on Mac OS X (Sierra) and noticed the same symptom you described: when the config file is in /tmp the viper WatchConfig call was not causing the viper OnConfigChange function to be called.
However, when I change the AddConfigPath to use the current working directory or my home directory then I do see logging from your OnConfigChange function. For example, try:
v.AddConfigPath("./")
I'd recommend experimenting with different directory locations to see if this is some sort of viper/fsnotify bug or limitation. For some reason, it doesn't appear to detect changes from the /tmp directory on Mac OS X, at least, it doesn't for my setup. I couldn't find any mention of problems with /tmp on OS X, but the fsnotify CONTRIBUTING.md does mention limitations with "shared" directories under Vagrant so perhaps there are some filesystem configurations that do not trigger notifications:
Notice: fsnotify file system events won't trigger in shared folders. The tests get around this limitation by using the /tmp directory.
Also, you don't need to keep calling WatchConfig and OnConfigChange via your goroutine. You can eliminate the goroutine completely and just move the relevant lines into init.