aah Application Binary

This document describes the aah application binary capabilities and its artifact details.

News: Since v0.11.0 aah supports single and non-single binary build artifact packaging.

Note:

Go binaries have no runtime dependencies (such as Go installation, GOPATH, libraries, etc.), once a binary is built for the targeted Operating System (OS), it runs on any machine of such targeted OS.

For example:

Building aah binary for Linux 64-bit OS - env GOOS=linux GOARCH=amd64 aah build <args>

Table of Contents

App Binary Help

Since v0.12.0 aah application binary evolved further. It provides powerful console commands with POSIX flags support.

jeeva@pmb-pro:~$ thumbai --help
Name:
  thumbai - A Go Mod Repository, Go Vanity and Simple Proxy Server

Usage:
  thumbai [global options] command [command options] [arguments...]

Version:
  1.0.0-beta

Build Timestamp:
  2018-11-23T00:42:32-08:00

Description:
  THUMBAI provides easy to use Go Mod Repository, Go Vanity and Simple Proxy Server

Commands:
  run, r   Runs application server
  vfs, v   Provides access to app VFS instance to interact with it
  help, h  Shows a list of commands or help for one command

Global Options:
  --help, -h     Shows app help
  --version, -v  Print app build information

Copyright:
  © Jeevanandam M. (https://github.com/jeevatkm), All rights reserved.
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Command Input Flags

Since v0.12.0 Application binary comes with one more commands with respective input flags. Explore it via command help.

For example: command run

jeeva@pmb-pro:~$ thumbai help run
Name:
  thumbai run - Runs application server

Usage:
  thumbai run [command options] [arguments...]

Description:
  Runs application server.

Options:
  --envprofile value, -e value  Environment profile name to activate (e.g: dev, qa, prod) (default: "dev")
  --config FILE, -c FILE        External config FILE for adding or overriding 'config/**/*.conf' values
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Start

Since v0.11.0 No intermediate script to start, stop, etc.

To start aah application, simply use the binary with command.

For example

$ /home/app/thumbai/bin/thumbai run --envprofile prod --config /home/app/thumbai/thumbai.conf
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Stop

aah application binary listens to SIGINT and SIGTERM OS signal. On receiving these signals:

  • Application publishes OnPreShutdown server extension event.
  • Application performs the graceful shutdown with timeout of server.timeout.grace_shutdown from aah.conf.
  • Application publishes OnPostShutdown server extension event.
$ kill -TERM <process-id>
# OR
$ kill -INT <process-id>
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Reload

Since v0.10.0 aah application binary supports Hot-Reload via SIGHUP. Basically the app performs the same steps as Start but reloading config, i18n, views, etc. without actually restarting itself.

$ kill -HUP <process-id>
# OR if you have configured application via systemd
$ systemctl reload thumbai.service   # service thumbai reload
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Application logs inform of this reload process. Example below:

2018-05-19 22:51:08.452 WARN  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 Hangup signal (SIGHUP) received
2018-05-19 22:51:08.452 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 Application hot-reload and reinitialization starts ...
2018-05-19 22:51:08.455 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 Configuration files reload succeeded
2018-05-19 22:51:08.456 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 Configuration values reinitialize succeeded
2018-05-19 22:51:08.456 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 Logging reinitialize succeeded
2018-05-19 22:51:08.456 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 I18n reinitialize succeeded
2018-05-19 22:51:08.457 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 Router reinitialize succeeded
2018-05-19 22:51:08.564 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 View engine reinitialize succeeded
2018-05-19 22:51:08.564 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 Security reinitialize succeeded
2018-05-19 22:51:08.564 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 Access logging reinitialize succeeded
2018-05-19 22:51:08.564 INFO  aahwebsite sfo-aahweb-01 Application hot-reload and reinitialization was successful
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Know your Embedded Files

Since v0.11.0 aah supports single binary build packaging.

aah provides command vfs and its sub-commands to explore files embedded into the application binary. It accepts regular expression as an input via flag pattern and will print the file/directory path which matches the given regex pattern.

Idea behind command vfs: Typically once the single binary is built, there would be no easy way to know which files have been embedded into the binary. In a real world scenario, it’s important to have some mechanism to find out the contents. It could also be helpful for developers, devops, etc.


Help: vfs sub-command find

For regex syntax refer to https://golang.org/pkg/regexp or run go doc regexp/syntax on terminal.

jeeva@pmb-pro:~$ thumbai vfs help find
Name:
  thumbai vfs find - Finds the embedded file/directory path that matches the given regex pattern

Usage:
  thumbai vfs find [command options] [arguments...]

Description:
  Finds the embedded file/directory path that matches the given regex pattern.

    Example:
      <app-binary> vfs find --pattern "conf$"

Options:
  --pattern value, -p value  Regex pattern to find the files in the app VFS instance
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Example: vfs sub-command find

For regex syntax refer to https://golang.org/pkg/regexp or run go doc regexp/syntax on terminal.

jeeva@pmb-pro:~$ thumbai vfs find --pattern "conf"
drwxr-xr-x      0B Oct  4 18:18:00 /app/config
-r--r--r--   5.6KB Nov 23 08:41:06 /app/config/aah.conf
drwxr-xr-x      0B Oct 12 02:35:11 /app/config/env
-r--r--r--    867B Oct 12 02:41:41 /app/config/env/dev.conf
-r--r--r--   1.1KB Oct 15 01:35:54 /app/config/env/prod.conf
-r--r--r--   8.4KB Nov  3 21:56:04 /app/config/routes.conf
-r--r--r--   3.3KB Sep 18 06:00:45 /app/config/security.conf
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Cross Compile Build

Since go1.5 we can build cross platform build easily. aah framework supports it, refer Cross Compile Build

Build Artifact Naming Convention

aah build produces the build artifact name as <app-binary-name>-<version>-<goos>-<goarch>.zip. Also you can supply your custom name for the artifact via --output or -o.

For e.g.: aahwebsite-381eaa8-darwin-amd64.zip