Learning path

While we do consider Neoroute a relatively simple framework, we do also recognize that we’ve introduced a lot of layers and objects that need explanations. This page is supposed to provide a structure and route through this documentation that allows you to learn Neoroute in a sensible way.

0. Base knowledge

Before we get any of this started, I want to let you know that using Neoroute requires at least an intermediate understanding of Go. We use a lot of Go’s recent features, which is why we literally require Go 1.27, the newest release as of writing this.

You need to know at least how to use Go’s generics and know your way around Go’s testing framework. We don’t explain any of that here.

1. The router

The first basic object you need to use Neoroute is a Router. It is the layer that will receive and process messages coming into the server. It will route the messages to the routes you register on it.

1.1. Because we use MessagePack, a little bit of a rare encoding format for your messages, you should also look into how that works. We have a little crash course here, but if you want to look into it more deeply, the msgp repository has a great wiki covering everything.

1.2. When you have gotten to the level of being able to declare a encodable and decodable struct using msgp, you can continue to learn all about the Router object here.

2. The transporter

Now that you have a router, you somehow need to expose some routes you have to the network. That’s where the Transporter comes in. We have different ones, but all have the same job: They handle the actual networking needed to accept requests and more.

Choose your character (transporter): HTTP or WebSocket. Do this based on the type of app you’re trying to build.

Optional: If you chose WebSocket, you may also want to learn how to use events & adapters to send your client some data from the server.

With the guide for the transporters, you should now also have a running web server. And what can I say, that’s it for the server part, below we have listed some of the things we now always add in. And we strongly encourage you do too! Or skip to the client part.

3. Recommendations from here

3.1. Code generation: You don’t want to paste the structs from your server to your client, so setup neogen. It’s like a few lines of code, you can do it! Very strong recommendation here because this saves you so much time and suffering.

3.2. Debugger: You can’t just generate definitions for your client from the setup you just did, you can also start our debugging CLI neodebug to send requests to your server and receive events from it. Also just a few lines, we strongly recommend you set this up.

3.3. Testing: We know you probably hate testing, but we make it very simple to call the route functions you have without having to install anything weird or using a client connection. Learn more here. You probably wanna test your server at some point, right?

4. Connecting to your server

What is a server without a client? Well, useless. Let’s change that and build something that can connect. Again also here, we recommend you use code generation.

4.1. Choose the language you want for your client: Go or TypeScript.

4.2. Choose the connector you want to use for your client: HTTP or WebSocket. This should match the transporter you chose for your server.

4.3. Learn how to send requests and receive events here.

And THAT’S IT. You have finally been enlightened with basically everything there is to know about this framework. We hope you love it just as much as we do now!