Grpc And Protobuf

gRPC and Protocol Buffers

Overview

gRPC + Protobuf provide efficient, strongly-typed RPCs. Compatibility discipline is critical because binary contracts are less forgiving than JSON.

When to Use

• Designing internal service-to-service APIs
• High-performance or polyglot RPC needs
• Reviewing .proto files and breaking-change risks

Key Practices

• Follow Protobuf best practices for field numbers and reserved fields
• Prefer additive, backward-compatible changes
• Use reserved for removed fields/numbers
• Document expected error model (status codes + details)
• Consider streaming use cases deliberately (unary vs server/client/bidi)
• Generate code and keep stubs in sync via CI

Compatibility Rules (High Level)

• Do not reuse field numbers
• Do not change field types in incompatible ways
• Mark fields as reserved when removing them
• Be cautious with required fields (proto3 optional semantics)

Verification

• Breaking changes are detected (buf breaking / similar)
• Generated code is up to date
• Error handling is consistent across services