recipe v0.3.0 Recipe behaviour View Source
Intro
The Recipe
module allows implementing multi-step, reversible workflows.
For example, you may wanna parse some incoming data, write to two different
data stores and then push some notifications. If anything fails, you wanna
rollback specific changes in different data stores. Recipe
allows you to do
that.
In addition, a recipe doesn’t enforce any constraint around which processes execute which step. You can assume that unless you explicitly involve other processes, all code that builds a recipe is executed by default by the calling process.
Ideal use cases are:
- multi-step operations where you need basic transactional properties, e.g. saving data to Postgresql and Redis, rolling back the change in Postgresql if the Redis write fails
- interaction with services that simply don’t support transactions
- composing multiple workflows that can share steps (with the
help of
Kernel.defdelegate/2
) - trace workflows execution via a correlation id
You can avoid using this library if:
- A simple
with
macro will do - You don’t care about failure semantics and just want your operation to crash the calling process
- Using Ecto, you can express your workflow with
Ecto.Multi
Heavily inspired by the ktn_recipe
module included in inaka/erlang-katana.
Core ideas
- A workflow as a set of discreet steps
- Each step can have a specific error handling scenario
- Each step is a separate function that receives a state with the result of all previous steps
- Each step should be easily testable in isolation
- Each workflow run is identified by a correlation id
Example
The example below outlines a possible workflow where a user creates a new conversation, passing an initial message.
Each step is named in steps/0
. Each step definition uses data added to the
workflow state and performs a specific task.
Any error shortcuts the workflow to handle_error/3
, where a specialized
clause for :create_initial_message
deletes the conversation if the system
failes to create the initial message (therefore simulating a transaction).
defmodule StartNewConversation do
use Recipe
### Public API
def run(user_id, initial_message_text) do
state = Recipe.initial_state
|> Recipe.assign(:user_id, user_id)
|> Recipe.assign(:initial_message_text, initial_message_text)
Recipe.run(__MODULE__, state)
end
### Callbacks
def steps, do: [:validate,
:create_conversation,
:create_initial_message,
:broadcast_new_conversation,
:broadcast_new_message]
def handle_result(state) do
state.assigns.conversation
end
def handle_error(:create_initial_message, _error, state) do
Service.Conversation.delete(state.conversation.id)
end
def handle_error(_step, error, _state), do: error
### Steps
def validate(state) do
text = state.assigns.initial_message_text
if MessageValidator.valid_text?(text) do
{:ok, state}
else
{:error, :empty_message_text}
end
end
def create_conversation(state) do
case Service.Conversation.create(state.assigns.user_id) do
{:ok, conversation} ->
{:ok, Recipe.assign(state, :conversation, conversation)}
error ->
error
end
end
def create_initial_message(state) do
%{user_id: user_id,
conversation: conversation,
initial_message_text: text} = state.assigns
case Service.Message.create(user_id, conversation.id, text) do
{:ok, message} ->
{:ok, Recipe.assign(state, :initial_message, message)}
error ->
error
end
end
def broadcast_new_conversation(state) do
Dispatcher.broadcast("conversation-created", state.assigns.conversation)
{:ok, state}
end
def broadcast_new_message(state) do
Dispatcher.broadcast("message-created", state.assigns.initial_message)
{:ok, state}
end
end
Link to this section Summary
Functions
Assigns a new value in the recipe state under the specified key
Returns an empty recipe state. Useful in conjunction with Recipe.run/2
Logs a step execution (debug level)
Runs a recipe, identified by a module which implements the Recipe
behaviour, allowing to specify the initial state
Callbacks
Invoked any time a step fails. Receives the name of the failed step, the error and the state
Invoked at the end of the recipe, it receives the state obtained at the last step
Lists all steps included in the recipe, e.g. [:square, :double]
Link to this section Types
log_function :: {module, function_name} | (step, t -> term)
run_opts() :: [log_steps: boolean, correlation_id: Recipe.UUID.t]
t() :: %Recipe{assigns: %{}, correlation_id: nil | Recipe.UUID.t, log_function: log_function, recipe_module: module, run_opts: Recipe.run_opts}
Link to this section Functions
Assigns a new value in the recipe state under the specified key.
Keys are available for reading under the assigns
key.
iex> state = Recipe.initial_state |> Recipe.assign(:user_id, 1)
iex> state.assigns.user_id
1
Returns an empty recipe state. Useful in conjunction with Recipe.run/2
.
Logs a step execution (debug level).
This function is used by default when a recipe is run with log_steps: true
and
can be overridden by passing log_function: {module, function_name}
. See the documentation
for Recipe.run/3
for more information.
run(recipe_module, t, run_opts) :: {:ok, Recipe.UUID.t, term} | {:error, term}
Runs a recipe, identified by a module which implements the Recipe
behaviour, allowing to specify the initial state.
In case of a successful run, it will return a 3-element tuple {:ok,
correlation_id, result}
, where correlation_id
is a uuid that can be used
to connect this workflow with another one and result
is the return value of
the handle_result/1
callback.
Supports an optional third argument (a keyword list) for extra options:
:log_steps
: when true, log (at debug level) each step with the updated state:log_function
: this value can either be a 2-element tuple{module_name, function_name}
or a plain function; the function will receive two values, the current step name and the current state, and can be used to log the current step execution. By default theRecipe.log_step/2
function is used. SeeRecipe.log_function/0
as well to check its typing.:correlation_id
: you can override the automatically generated correlation id by passing it as an option. A uuid can be generated withRecipe.UUID.generate/0
Example
Recipe.run(Workflow, Recipe.initial_state(), log_steps: true)
Link to this section Callbacks
Invoked any time a step fails. Receives the name of the failed step, the error and the state.
Invoked at the end of the recipe, it receives the state obtained at the last step.
Lists all steps included in the recipe, e.g. [:square, :double]