Importing the driver Instantiating the driver CRUD operations Working with Amazon Ion

Amazon QLDB driver for Go – Cookbook reference

This reference guide shows common use cases of the Amazon QLDB driver for Go. It provides Go code examples that demonstrate how to use the driver to run basic create, read, update, and delete (CRUD) operations. It also includes code examples for processing Amazon Ion data. In addition, this guide highlights best practices for making transactions idempotent and implementing uniqueness constraints.

Note

Where applicable, some use cases have different code examples for each supported major version of the QLDB driver for Go.

Importing the driver

The following code example imports the driver and other required AWS packages.

Note

This example also imports the Amazon Ion package (amzn/ion-go/ion). You need this package to process Ion data when running some data operations in this reference. To learn more, see Working with Amazon Ion.

Instantiating the driver

The following code example creates an instance of the driver that connects to a specified ledger name in a specified AWS Region.

CRUD operations

QLDB runs create, read, update, and delete (CRUD) operations as part of a transaction.

Warning

As a best practice, make your write transactions strictly idempotent.

Making transactions idempotent

We recommend that you make write transactions idempotent to avoid any unexpected side effects in the case of retries. A transaction is idempotent if it can run multiple times and produce identical results each time.

For example, consider a transaction that inserts a document into a table named Person. The transaction should first check whether or not the document already exists in the table. Without this check, the table might end up with duplicate documents.

Suppose that QLDB successfully commits the transaction on the server side, but the client times out while waiting for a response. If the transaction isn't idempotent, the same document could be inserted more than once in the case of a retry.

Using indexes to avoid full table scans

We also recommend that you run statements with a WHERE predicate clause using an equality operator on an indexed field or a document ID; for example, WHERE indexedField = 123 or WHERE indexedField IN (456, 789). Without this indexed lookup, QLDB needs to do a table scan, which can lead to transaction timeouts or optimistic concurrency control (OCC) conflicts.

For more information about OCC, see Amazon QLDB concurrency model.

Implicitly created transactions

The QLDBDriver.Execute function accepts a lambda function that receives an instance of Transaction, which you can use to run statements. The instance of Transaction wraps an implicitly created transaction.

You can run statements within the lambda function by using the Transaction.Execute function. The driver implicitly commits the transaction when the lambda function returns.

The following sections show how to run basic CRUD operations, specify custom retry logic, and implement uniqueness constraints.

Creating tables


result, err := driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  return txn.Execute("CREATE TABLE Person")
})

Creating indexes


result, err := driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  return txn.Execute("CREATE INDEX ON Person(GovId)")
})

Reading documents


var decodedResult map[string]interface{}

// Assumes that Person table has documents as follows:
// { "GovId": "TOYENC486FH", "FirstName": "Brent" }
_, err = driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  result, err := txn.Execute("SELECT * FROM Person WHERE GovId = 'TOYENC486FH'")
  if err != nil {
    return nil, err
  }
  for result.Next(txn) {
    ionBinary := result.GetCurrentData()
    err = ion.Unmarshal(ionBinary, &decodedResult)
    if err != nil {
      return nil, err
    }
    fmt.Println(decodedResult) // prints map[GovId: TOYENC486FH FirstName:Brent]
  }
  if result.Err() != nil {
    return nil, result.Err()
  }
  return nil, nil
})
if err != nil {
  panic(err)
}

Using query parameters

The following code example uses a native type query parameter.


result, err := driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  return txn.Execute("SELECT * FROM Person WHERE GovId = ?", "TOYENC486FH")
})
if err != nil {
  panic(err)
}

The following code example uses multiple query parameters.


result, err := driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  return txn.Execute("SELECT * FROM Person WHERE GovId = ? AND FirstName = ?", "TOYENC486FH", "Brent")
})
if err != nil {
  panic(err)
}

The following code example uses a list of query parameters.


govIDs := []string{}{"TOYENC486FH", "ROEE1", "YH844"}

result, err := driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  return txn.Execute("SELECT * FROM Person WHERE GovId IN (?,?,?)", govIDs...)
})
if err != nil {
  panic(err)
}

Note

When you run a query without an indexed lookup, it invokes a full table scan. In this example, we recommend having an index on the GovId field to optimize performance. Without an index on GovId, queries can have more latency and can also lead to OCC conflict exceptions or transaction timeouts.

Inserting documents

The following code example inserts native data types.


_, err = driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  // Check if a document with a GovId of TOYENC486FH exists
  // This is critical to make this transaction idempotent
  result, err := txn.Execute("SELECT * FROM Person WHERE GovId = ?", "TOYENC486FH")
  if err != nil {
    return nil, err
  }
  // Check if there are any results
  if result.Next(txn) {
    // Document already exists, no need to insert
  } else {
    person := map[string]interface{}{
      "GovId": "TOYENC486FH",
      "FirstName": "Brent",
    }
    _, err = txn.Execute("INSERT INTO Person ?", person)
    if err != nil {
      return nil, err
    }
  }
  return nil, nil
})

This transaction inserts a document into the Person table. Before inserting, it first checks if the document already exists in the table. This check makes the transaction idempotent in nature. Even if you run this transaction multiple times, it won't cause any unintended side effects.

Note

In this example, we recommend having an index on the GovId field to optimize performance. Without an index on GovId, statements can have more latency and can also lead to OCC conflict exceptions or transaction timeouts.

Inserting multiple documents in one statement

To insert multiple documents by using a single INSERT statement, you can pass a parameter of type list to the statement as follows.


// people is a list
txn.Execute("INSERT INTO People ?", people)

You don't enclose the variable placeholder (?) in double angle brackets ( <<...>> ) when passing a list. In manual PartiQL statements, double angle brackets denote an unordered collection known as a bag.

Updating documents

The following code example uses native data types.


result, err := driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  return txn.Execute("UPDATE Person SET FirstName = ? WHERE GovId = ?", "John", "TOYENC486FH")
})

Note

Deleting documents

The following code example uses native data types.


result, err := driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  return txn.Execute("DELETE FROM Person WHERE GovId = ?", "TOYENC486FH")
})

Note

Running multiple statements in a transaction


// This code snippet is intentionally trivial. In reality you wouldn't do this because you'd
// set your UPDATE to filter on vin and insured, and check if you updated something or not.
func InsureCar(driver *qldbdriver.QLDBDriver, vin string) (bool, error) {
    insured, err := driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {

        result, err := txn.Execute(
            "SELECT insured FROM Vehicles WHERE vin = ? AND insured = FALSE", vin)
        if err != nil {
            return false, err
        }

        hasNext := result.Next(txn)
        if !hasNext && result.Err() != nil {
            return false, result.Err()
        }

        if hasNext {
            _, err = txn.Execute(
                "UPDATE Vehicles SET insured = TRUE WHERE vin = ?", vin)
            if err != nil {
                return false, err
            }
            return true, nil
        }
        return false, nil
    })
    if err != nil {
        panic(err)
    }

    return insured.(bool), err
}

Retry logic

The driver's Execute function has a built-in retry mechanism that retries the transaction if a retryable exception occurs (such as timeouts or OCC conflicts). The maximum number of retry attempts and the backoff strategy are configurable.

The default retry limit is 4, and the default backoff strategy is ExponentialBackoffStrategy with a base of 10 milliseconds. You can set the retry policy per driver instance and also per transaction by using an instance of RetryPolicy.

The following code example specifies retry logic with a custom retry limit and a custom backoff strategy for an instance of the driver.


import (
  "github.com/aws/aws-sdk-go/aws"
  "github.com/aws/aws-sdk-go/aws/session"
  "github.com/aws/aws-sdk-go/service/qldbsession"
  "github.com/awslabs/amazon-qldb-driver-go/v2/qldbdriver"
)

func main() {
  awsSession := session.Must(session.NewSession(aws.NewConfig().WithRegion("us-east-1")))
  qldbSession := qldbsession.New(awsSession)

  // Configuring retry limit to 2
  retryPolicy := qldbdriver.RetryPolicy{MaxRetryLimit: 2}

  driver, err := qldbdriver.New("test-ledger", qldbSession, func(options *qldbdriver.DriverOptions) {
    options.RetryPolicy = retryPolicy
  })
  if err != nil {
    panic(err)
  }

  // Configuring an exponential backoff strategy with base of 20 milliseconds
  retryPolicy = qldbdriver.RetryPolicy{
    MaxRetryLimit: 2,
    Backoff: qldbdriver.ExponentialBackoffStrategy{SleepBase: 20, SleepCap: 4000,
    }}

  driver, err = qldbdriver.New("test-ledger", qldbSession, func(options *qldbdriver.DriverOptions) {
    options.RetryPolicy = retryPolicy
  })
  if err != nil {
    panic(err)
  }
}

The following code example specifies retry logic with a custom retry limit and a custom backoff strategy for a particular anonymous function. The SetRetryPolicy function overrides the retry policy that is set for the driver instance.


import (
  "context"
  "github.com/aws/aws-sdk-go/aws"
  "github.com/aws/aws-sdk-go/aws/session"
  "github.com/aws/aws-sdk-go/service/qldbsession"
  "github.com/awslabs/amazon-qldb-driver-go/v2/qldbdriver"
)

func main() {
  awsSession := session.Must(session.NewSession(aws.NewConfig().WithRegion("us-east-1")))
  qldbSession := qldbsession.New(awsSession)

  // Configuring retry limit to 2
  retryPolicy1 := qldbdriver.RetryPolicy{MaxRetryLimit: 2}

  driver, err := qldbdriver.New("test-ledger", qldbSession, func(options *qldbdriver.DriverOptions) {
    options.RetryPolicy = retryPolicy1
  })
  if err != nil {
    panic(err)
  }

  // Configuring an exponential backoff strategy with base of 20 milliseconds
  retryPolicy2 := qldbdriver.RetryPolicy{
    MaxRetryLimit: 2,
    Backoff: qldbdriver.ExponentialBackoffStrategy{SleepBase: 20, SleepCap: 4000,
    }}

  // Overrides the retry policy set by the driver instance
  driver.SetRetryPolicy(retryPolicy2)

  driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
    return txn.Execute("CREATE TABLE Person")
  })
}

Implementing uniqueness constraints

QLDB doesn't support unique indexes, but you can implement this behavior in your application.

Suppose that you want to implement a uniqueness constraint on the GovId field in the Person table. To do this, you can write a transaction that does the following:

Assert that the table has no existing documents with a specified GovId.
Insert the document if the assertion passes.

If a competing transaction concurrently passes the assertion, only one of the transactions will commit successfully. The other transaction will fail with an OCC conflict exception.

The following code example shows how to implement this uniqueness constraint logic.


govID := "TOYENC486FH"

document := map[string]interface{}{
  "GovId":     "TOYENC486FH",
  "FirstName": "Brent",
}

result, err := driver.Execute(context.Background(), func(txn qldbdriver.Transaction) (interface{}, error) {
  // Check if doc with GovId = govID exists
  result, err := txn.Execute("SELECT * FROM Person WHERE GovId = ?", govID)
  if err != nil {
    return nil, err
  }
  // Check if there are any results
  if result.Next(txn) {
    // Document already exists, no need to insert
    return nil, nil
  }
  return txn.Execute("INSERT INTO Person ?", document)
})
if err != nil {
  panic(err)
}

Note

Working with Amazon Ion

The following sections show how to use the Amazon Ion module to process Ion data.

Importing the Ion module


import "github.com/amzn/ion-go/ion"

Creating Ion types

The Ion library for Go currently doesn't support the Document Object Model (DOM), so you can't create Ion data types. But you can marshal and unmarshal between Go native types and Ion binary when working with QLDB.

Getting Ion binary


aDict := map[string]interface{}{
  "GovId": "TOYENC486FH",
  "FirstName": "Brent",
}

ionBytes, err := ion.MarshalBinary(aDict)
if err != nil {
  panic(err)
}

fmt.Println(ionBytes) // prints [224 1 0 234 238 151 129 131 222 147 135 190 144 133 71 111 118 73 100 137 70 105 114 115 116 78 97 109 101 222 148 138 139 84 79 89 69 78 67 52 56 54 70 72 139 133 66 114 101 110 116]

Getting Ion text


aDict := map[string]interface{}{
  "GovId": "TOYENC486FH",
  "FirstName": "Brent",
}

ionBytes, err := ion.MarshalText(aDict)
if err != nil {
  panic(err)
}

fmt.Println(string(ionBytes)) // prints {FirstName:"Brent",GovId:"TOYENC486FH"}

For more information about Ion, see the Amazon Ion documentation on GitHub. For more code examples of working with Ion in QLDB, see Working with Amazon Ion data types in Amazon QLDB.

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Document Conventions

Quick start tutorial

Node.js driver

Amazon QLDB driver for Go – Cookbook reference

Note

Contents

Importing the driver

Note

Instantiating the driver

CRUD operations

Warning

Contents

Creating tables

Creating indexes

Reading documents

Using query parameters

Note

Inserting documents

Note

Inserting multiple documents in one statement

Updating documents

Note

Deleting documents

Note

Running multiple statements in a transaction

Retry logic

Implementing uniqueness constraints

Note

Working with Amazon Ion

Contents

Importing the Ion module

Creating Ion types

Getting Ion binary

Getting Ion text