gRPC

Description: gRPC is a modern open source high performance Remote Procedure Call (RPC) framework that can run in any environment

The main benefits of gRPC are:

• Modern, high-performance, lightweight RPC framework.
• Contract-first API development, using Protocol Buffers by default, allowing for language agnostic implementations.
• Tooling available for many languages to generate strongly-typed servers and clients.
• Supports client, server, and bi-directional streaming calls.
• Reduced network usage with Protobuf binary serialization.

These benefits make gRPC ideal for:

• Lightweight microservices where efficiency is critical (e.g. controlling lab automation instruments as part of an integrated system).
• Polyglot systems where multiple languages are required for development (Lab automation integration software can be written in any language).
• Point-to-point real-time services that need to handle streaming requests or responses (e.g. instrument control commands and responses, status requests, data extraction, etc).

Standard Type: Software

Sub-type: Instrument Interface

Governing Body: Created by Google, open source.