Avro4s is a schema/class generation and serializing/deserializing library for Avro written in Scala. The objective is to allow seamless use with Scala without the need to to write boilerplate conversions yourself, and without the runtime overhead of reflection. Hence, this is a macro based library and generates code for use with Avro at compile time.

The features of the library are:

• Schema generation from classes at compile time
• Boilerplate free serialization of Scala types into Avro types
• Boilerplate free deserialization of Avro types to Scala types

Unlike Json, Avro is a schema based format. You'll find yourself wanting to generate schemas frequently, and writing these by hand or through the Java based SchemaBuilder classes can be tiring for complex domain models. Avro4s allows us to generate schemas directly from case classes at compile time via macros. This gives you both the convenience of generated code, without the annoyance of having to run a code generation step, as well as avoiding the peformance penalty of runtime generated code.

Let's define some classes.

case class Ingredient(name: String, sugar: Double, fat: Double)
case class Pizza(name: String, ingredients: Seq[Ingredient], vegetarian: Boolean, vegan: Boolean, calories: Int)

To generate an Avro Schema, we need to invoke the apply method of the AvroSchema object passing in the target type as a type parameter. This will return an org.apache.avro.Schema instance.

import com.sksamuel.avro4s.AvroSchema
val schema = AvroSchema[Pizza]

Where the generated schema is as follows:

{
   "type":"record",
   "name":"Pizza",
   "namespace":"com.sksamuel.avro4s.json",
   "fields":[
      {
         "name":"name",
         "type":"string"
      },
      {
         "name":"ingredients",
         "type":{
            "type":"array",
            "items":{
               "type":"record",
               "name":"Ingredient",
               "fields":[
                  {
                     "name":"name",
                     "type":"string"
                  },
                  {
                     "name":"sugar",
                     "type":"double"
                  },
                  {
                     "name":"fat",
                     "type":"double"
                  }
               ]
            }
         }
      },
      {
         "name":"vegetarian",
         "type":"boolean"
      },
      {
         "name":"vegan",
         "type":"boolean"
      },
      {
         "name":"calories",
         "type":"int"
      }
   ]
}

You can see that the schema generator handles nested case classes, sequences, primitives, etc. For a full list of supported object types, see the table later.

Avro schemas for complex types (RECORDS) contain a name and a namespace. By default, these are the name of the class and the enclosing package name, but it is possible to customize these using the annotations AvroName and AvroNamespace.

For example, the following class:

package com.foo
case class Test(a: String)

Would normally have a schema like this:

{
  "type":"record",
  "name":"Test",
  "namespace":"com.foo",
  "fields":[
    {
      "name":"a",
      "type":"string"
    }
  ]
}

However we can override the name and/or the namespace like this:

package com.foo

@AvroName("Wibble")
@AvroNamespace("com.other")
case class Test(a: String)

And then the generated schema looks like this:

{
  "type":"record",
  "name":"Wibble",
  "namespace":"com.other",
  "fields":[
    {
      "name":"a",
      "type":"string"
    }
  ]
}

Note: It is possible, but not necessary, to use both AvroName and AvroNamespace. You can just use one of them if you wish.

The AvroName annotation can also be used to override field names. This is useful when the record instances you are generating or reading need to have field names different from the scala case classes.

For example, given the following class.

case class Foo(a: String, @AvroName("z") b : String)

Then a record of Foo("a", "b") would be written as { a: "a", z: "b" }. Similarly, this record could be decoded back to an instance of Foo.

Note: @AvroName does not add an alternative name for the field, but an override. If you wish to have alternatives then you want to use @AvroAlias.

Avro allows a doc field, and arbitrary key/values to be added to generated schemas. Avro4s supports this through the use of AvroDoc and AvroProp annotations.

These properties works on either complex or simple types - in other words, on both fields and classes. For example:

package com.sksamuel
@AvroDoc("hello its me")
case class Example(@AvroDoc("I am a string") str: String, @AvroDoc("I am a long") long: Long, int: Int)

Would result in the following schema:

{  
  "type": "record",
  "name": "Example",
  "namespace": "com.sksamuel",
  "doc":"hello its me",
  "fields": [  
    {  
      "name": "str",
      "type": "string",
      "doc" : "I am a string"
    },
    {  
      "name": "long",
      "type": "long",
      "doc" : "I am a long"
    },
    {  
      "name": "int",
      "type": "int"
    }
  ]
}

An example of properties:

package com.sksamuel
@AvroProp("jack", "bruce")
case class Annotated(@AvroProp("richard", "ashcroft") str: String, @AvroProp("kate", "bush") long: Long, int: Int)

Would generate this schema:

{
  "type": "record",
  "name": "Annotated",
  "namespace": "com.sksamuel.avro4s.schema",
  "fields": [
    {
      "name": "str",
      "type": "string",
      "richard": "ashcroft"
    },
    {
      "name": "long",
      "type": "long",
      "kate": "bush"
    },
    {
      "name": "int",
      "type": "int"
    }
  ],
  "jack": "bruce"
}

Behind the scenes, AvroSchema uses an implicit SchemaFor. This is the core typeclass which generates an Avro schema for a given Java or Scala type. There are SchemaFor instances for all the common JDK and SDK types, as well as macros that generate instances for case classes.

In order to override how a schema is generatef you need to bring into scope an implicit SchemaFor for the type you want to override. As an example, lets say you wanted all Strings to be encoded as Schema.Type.BYTES rather than the standard Schema.Type.STRING. Then we could create an implicit like this:

implicit object MyStringOverride extends SchemaFor[String] {
  override def schema: Schema = SchemaBuilder.builder.bytesType
}

case class Foo(a: String)

val schema = AvroSchema[Foo]

Note: If you create an override like this, be aware that schemas in Avro are mutable, so don't share instances of the schemas.

Avro4s supports recursive schemas, but you will have to manually force the SchemaFor instance, instead of letting it be generated.

case class Recursive(payload: Int, next: Option[Recursive])

implicit val schemaFor = SchemaFor[Recursive]
val schema = AvroSchema[Recursive]

Avro4s allows us to easily serialize case classes using an instance of AvroOutputStream which we write to, and close, just like you would any regular output stream. An AvroOutputStream can be created from a File, Path, or by wrapping another OutputStream. When we create one, we specify the type of objects that we will be serializing and provide a writer schema. For example, to serialize instances of our Pizza class:

import java.io.File
import com.sksamuel.avro4s.AvroOutputStream

val pepperoni = Pizza("pepperoni", Seq(Ingredient("pepperoni", 12, 4.4), Ingredient("onions", 1, 0.4)), false, false, 598)
val hawaiian = Pizza("hawaiian", Seq(Ingredient("ham", 1.5, 5.6), Ingredient("pineapple", 5.2, 0.2)), false, false, 391)

val schema = AvroSchema[Pizza]

val os = AvroOutputStream.data[Pizza].to(new File("pizzas.avro")).build(schema)
os.write(Seq(pepperoni, hawaiian))
os.flush()
os.close()

We can easily deserialize a file back into case classes. Given the pizzas.avro file we generated in the previous section on serialization, we will read this back in using the AvroInputStream class. We first create an instance of the input stream specifying the types we will read back, the source file, and then build it using a reader schema.

Once the input stream is created, we can invoke iterator which will return a lazy iterator that reads on demand the data in the file.

In this example, we'll load all data at once from the iterator via toSet.

import com.sksamuel.avro4s.AvroInputStream

val schema = AvroSchema[Pizza]

val is = AvroInputStream.data[Pizza].from(new File("pizzas.avro")).build(schema)
val pizzas = is.iterator.toSet
is.close()

println(pizzas.mkString("\n"))

Will print out:

Pizza(pepperoni,List(Ingredient(pepperoni,12.2,4.4), Ingredient(onions,1.2,0.4)),false,false,500)
Pizza(hawaiian,List(Ingredient(ham,1.5,5.6), Ingredient(pineapple,5.2,0.2)),false,false,500)

You can serialize as binary or json by specifying the format when creating the input or output stream. In the earlier example we use data which is considered the "default" for Avro.

To use json or binary, you can do the following:

AvroOutputStream.binary.to(...).build(...)
AvroOutputStream.json.to(...).build(...)

AvroInputStream.binary.from(...).build(...)
AvroInputStream.json.from(...).build(...)

Note: Binary serialization does not include the schema in the output.

In Avro there are two container interfaces designed for complex types - GenericRecord, which is the most commonly used, along with the lesser used SpecificRecord. These record types are used with a schema of type Schema.Type.RECORD.

To interface with the Avro Java API or with third party frameworks like Kafka it is sometimes desirable to convert between your case classes and these records, rather than using the input/output streams that avro4s provides.

To perform conversions, use the RecordFormat typeclass which converts to/from case classes and Avro records.

Note: In Avro, GenericRecord and SpecificRecord don't have a common Record interface (just a Container interface which simply provides for a schema without any methods for accessing values), so avro4s has defined a Record trait, which is the union of the GenericRecord and SpecificRecord interfaces. This allows avro4s to generate records which implement both interfaces at the same time.

To convert from a class into a record:

case class Composer(name: String, birthplace: String, compositions: Seq[String])
val ennio = Composer("ennio morricone", "rome", Seq("legend of 1900", "ecstasy of gold"))
val format = RecordFormat[Composer]
// record is a type that implements both GenericRecord and Specific Record
val record = format.to(ennio)

And to go from a record back into a type:

// given some record from earlier
val record = ...
val format = RecordFormat[Composer]
val ennio = format.from(record)

Avro4s defines two typeclasses, Encoder and Decoder which do the work of mapping between scala values and Avro compatible values. There are built in encoders and decoders for all the common types.

For example, given a string, and a schema of type Schema.Type.STRING then the default encoder would return an instance of Utf8, whereas the same string and a Schema.Type.FIXED schema would be encoded as an instance of GenericData.Fixed.

Another example is given an Option[T] then an instance of None would be encoded as null, and an instance of Some would be encoded as the underlying value.

Decoders do the same work, but in reverse. They take an Avro value, such as null and return a scala value, such as Option.

import scala.collection.{Array, List, Seq, Iterable, Set, Map, Option, Either}
import shapeless.{:+:, CNil}

It is very easy to add custom type mappings. To do this, we bring into scope a custom implicit of Encoder[T] and/or Decoder[T].

For example, to create a custom type mapping for a type Foo which writes out the contents in upper case, but always reads the contents in lower case, we can do the following:

case class Foo(a: String, b: String)

implicit object FooEncoder extends Encoder[Foo] {
  override def encode(foo: Foo, schema: Schema): AnyRef = {
    val record = new GenericData.Record(schema)
    record.put("a", foo.a.toUpperCase)
    record.put("b", foo.b.toUpperCase)
    record
  }
}

implicit object FooDecoder extends Decoder[Foo] {
  override def decode(value: Any, schema: Schema): Foo = {
    val record = value.asInstanceOf[GenericRecord]
    Foo(record.get("a").toString.toLowerCase, record.get("b").toString.toLowerCase)
  }
}

Another example is changing the way we serialize LocalDateTime to store these dates as ISO strings. In this case, we are also changing the schema type from the default LONG to STRING, so we must add an implicit SchemaFor as well as the encoders and decoders.

implicit object DateTimeSchemaFor extends SchemaFor[LocalDateTime] {
  override val schema: Schema = Schema.create(Schema.Type.STRING)
}

implicit object DateTimeEncoder extends Encoder[LocalDateTime] {
  override def apply(value: LocalDateTime, schema: Schema): AnyRef = ISODateTimeFormat.dateTime().print(value)
}

implicit object DateTimeDecoder extends Decoder[LocalDateTime] {
  override def apply(value: Any, field: Field): LocalDateTime = ISODateTimeFormat.dateTime().parseDateTime(value.toString)
}

These typeclasses must be implicit and in scope when you use AvroSchema or RecordFormat.

Avro supports generalised unions, eithers of more than two values. To represent these in scala, we use shapeless.:+:, such that A :+: B :+: C :+: CNil represents cases where a type is A OR B OR C. See shapeless' documentation on coproducts for more on how to use coproducts.

Scala sealed traits/classes are supported both when it comes to schema generation and conversions to/from GenericRecord. Generally sealed hierarchies are encoded as unions - in the same way like Coproducts. Under the hood, shapeless Generic is used to derive Coproduct representation for sealed hierarchy.

When all descendants of sealed trait/class are singleton objects, optimized, enum-based encoding is used instead.

Bring an implicit ScalePrecisionRoundingMode into scope before using AvroSchema.

import com.sksamuel.avro4s.ScalePrecisionRoundingMode

case class MyDecimal(d: BigDecimal)

implicit val sp = ScalePrecisionRoundingMode(8, 20, RoundingMode.HALF_UP)
val schema = AvroSchema[MyDecimal]

{
  "type":"record",
  "name":"MyDecimal",
  "namespace":"com.foo",
  "fields":[{
    "name":"d",
    "type":{
      "type":"bytes",
      "logicalType":"decimal",
      "scale":"8",
      "precision":"20"
    }
  }]
}

When serializing a class with one or more type parameters, the avro name used in a schema is the name of the raw type, plus the actual type parameters. In other words, it would be of the form rawtype__typeparam1_typeparam2_..._typeparamN. So for example, the schema for a type Event[Foo] would have the avro name event__foo.

You can disable this by annotating the class with @AvroErasedName which uses the JVM erased name - in other words, it drops type parameter information. So the aforementioned Event[Foo] would be simply event.

You can selectively customise the way Avro4s generates certain parts of your hierarchy, thanks to implicit precedence. Suppose you have the following classes:

case class Product(name: String, price: Price, litres: BigDecimal)
case class Price(currency: String, amount: BigDecimal)

And you want to selectively use different scale/precision for the price and litres quantities. You can do this by forcing the implicits in the corresponding companion objects.

object Price {
  implicit val sp = ScalePrecisionRoundingMode(10, 2, scala.math.BigDecimal.RoundingMode.UNNECESSARY)
  implicit val schema = SchemaFor[Price]
}

object Product {
  implicit val sp = ScalePrecisionRoundingMode(8, 4, scala.math.BigDecimal.RoundingMode.UNNECESSARY)
  implicit val schema = SchemaFor[Product]
}

This will result in a schema where both BigDecimal quantities have their own separate scale and precision.

compile 'com.sksamuel.avro4s:avro4s-core_2.12:xxx'

libraryDependencies += "com.sksamuel.avro4s" %% "avro4s-core" % "xxx"

<dependency>
    <groupId>com.sksamuel.avro4s</groupId>
    <artifactId>avro4s-core_2.12</artifactId>
    <version>xxx</version>
</dependency>

Check the latest released version on Maven Central

Contributions to avro4s are always welcome. Good ways to contribute include:

• Raising bugs and feature requests
• Fixing bugs and enhancing the DSL
• Improving the performance of avro4s
• Adding to the documentation