Prerequisite

• Go 1.20 or above. To check Go version use the following command go version.

• Prior familiarity with Golang syntax is essential. Golang Tour is highly recommended as it has an excellent guided tour.

Write your first GoFr API

Let's start by initializing the go module by using the following command.

go mod init github.com/example

Add gofr package to the project using the following command.

go get gofr.dev

This code snippet showcases the creation of a simple GoFr application that defines a route and serves a response. You can add this code to your main.go file.

package main

import "gofr.dev/pkg/gofr"

func main() {
    // initialise gofr object
    app := gofr.New()

    // register route greet
    app.GET("/greet", func(ctx *gofr.Context) (interface{}, error) {

        return "Hello World!", nil
    })

    // Runs the server, it will listen on the default port 8000.
    // it can be over-ridden through configs
   app.Run()
}

Before starting the server, run the following command in your terminal to ensure you have downloaded and synchronized all required dependencies for your project.

go mod tidy

Once the dependencies are synchronized, start the GoFr server using the following command:

go run main.go

This would start the server at 8000 port, /greet endpoint can be accessed from your browser at http://localhost:8000/greet , you would be able to see the output as following with Status Code 200 as per REST Standard.

{ "data": "Hello World!" }

Understanding the example

The hello-world server involves three essential steps:

1. Creating GoFr Server:

   When gofr.New() is called, it initializes the framework and handles various setup tasks like initialising logger, metrics, datasources etc based on the configs.

   This single line is a standard part of all gofr servers.

2. Attaching a Handler to a Path:

   In this step, the server is instructed to associate an HTTP request with a specific handler function. This is achieved through app.GET("/greet", HandlerFunction), where GET /greet maps to HandlerFunction. Likewise, app.POST("/todo", ToDoCreationHandler) links a POST request to the /todo endpoint with ToDoCreationHandler.

   Good To Know

In Go, functions are first-class citizens, allowing easy handler definition and reference. HTTP Handler functions should follow the func(ctx *gofr.Context) (interface{}, error) signature. They take a context as input, returning two values: the response data and an error (set to nil when there is no error).

GoFr context ctx *gofr.Context serves as a wrapper for requests, responses, and dependencies, providing various functionalities.

3. Starting the server

   When app.Run() is called, it configures ,initiates and runs the HTTP server, middlewares. It manages essential features such as routes for health check endpoints, metrics server, favicon etc. It starts the server on the default port 8000.