Is it possible to parse protobuf in a generic fashion in Java?
I have looked into GeneratedMessage and could not find a way to parse any PB byte buffer into a GeneratedMessage.
Essentially, I am trying to parse a PB byte buffer into GeneratedMessage and then I would use reflection to detect fields inside it.
First of all, you can't parse PB data without knowing the schema. The schema originally comes from a ".proto" file and is typically embedded in the code generated by protoc
. However, you can also tell protoc
to store the schema in a format that's usable by the Java Protobuf library:
protoc --descriptor_set_out=mymessages.desc mymessages.proto
Then load it in your Java code:
FileInputStream fin = new FileInputStream("mymessages.desc");
Descriptors.FileDescriptorSet set =
Descriptors.FileDescriptorSet.parseFrom(fin);
Descriptors.Descriptor md = set.getFile(0).getMessageType(0);
Once you have the schema for a message (Descriptor.Descriptor
) parsing a message is easy:
byte[] data = ...;
DynamicMessage m = DynamicMessage.parseFrom(md, data);
DynamicMessage
has a reflective API that lets you look through the fields.
The messy part is calling out to the protoc
tool to convert the ".proto" file into a usable format. The C++ Protobuf library has a way to load ".proto" files directly, but unfortunately the Java Protobuf library does not.
I have working solution tested with last protobuf v.3.1.0
This is upgraded solution raised on previous answers. Thanks to both authors.
import com.example.address.AddressBookManager;
import com.example.address.AddressBookProtos.AddressBook;
import com.google.protobuf.DescriptorProtos.FileDescriptorSet;
import com.google.protobuf.Descriptors;
import com.google.protobuf.Descriptors.Descriptor;
import com.google.protobuf.Descriptors.FileDescriptor;
import com.google.protobuf.DynamicMessage;
import java.io.File;
import java.io.InputStream;
public class DynamicMessageDemo {
private static final String ADDRESS_BOOK_SOURCE_FILENAME = "test.ab";
private static final String ADDRESS_BOOK_DESC_FILENAME =
File.separator + "address.desc";
public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
InputStream is = DynamicMessageDemo.class
.getResourceAsStream(ADDRESS_BOOK_DESC_FILENAME);
FileDescriptorSet set = FileDescriptorSet.parseFrom(is);
FileDescriptor fd = Descriptors.FileDescriptor.buildFrom(
set.getFile(0),
new Descriptors.FileDescriptor[]{}
);
// "AddressBook" is the second message in my *.proto
// so index must be '1'
Descriptor messageType = fd.getMessageTypes().get(1);
// for testing purpose
AddressBook book = AddressBookManager.readFromFile(ADDRESS_BOOK_SOURCE_FILENAME);
byte[] data = book.toByteArray();
DynamicMessage message = DynamicMessage.parseFrom(messageType, data);
System.out.println("\n Dynamic message:\n" + message);
}
}
This is right example:
private static DynamicMessage parseData(byte[] data) throws IOException, DescriptorValidationException {
FileInputStream fin = new FileInputStream("test.desc");
DescriptorProtos.FileDescriptorSet set = DescriptorProtos.FileDescriptorSet.parseFrom(fin);
Descriptor md = Descriptors.FileDescriptor.buildFrom(set.getFile(0), new Descriptors.FileDescriptor[] {}).findMessageTypeByName("Person");
return DynamicMessage.parseFrom(md, data);
}
You can use UnknownFieldSet to parse generic protobuf messages.
Then you can get individual fields using provided methods (e.g. asMap(), hasField(), getField())
E.g. (data taken from this question):
byte[] msg = new byte[] { 0x0a, 0x10, 0x08, 0x7f, (byte)0x8a, 0x01, 0x04, 0x08, 0x02, 0x10, 0x03, (byte)0x92, 0x01, 0x04, 0x08, 0x02, 0x10, 0x03, 0x18, 0x01};
UnknownFieldSet eee = UnknownFieldSet.parseFrom(msg);
System.out.println(eee.toString());
Giving:
1: {
1: 127
17: {
1: 2
2: 3
}
18: {
1: 2
2: 3
}
}
3: 1