Dubbo Documentation

The most common way to use Dubbo is to run it in Spring framework. The following content will guide you to develop a Dubbo application with Spring framework’s XML configuration.

If you don’t want to rely on Spring, you can try using API configuration.

First let’s create a root directory called dubbo-demo:

mkdir dubbo-demo
cd dubbo-demo

Next, we are going to create 3 sub-directories under root directory:

dubbo-demo-api: the common service api
dubbo-demo-provider: the demo provider codes
dubbo-demo-consumer: the demo consumer codes

Service provider

Defining service interfaces

DemoService.java [1]：

package org.apache.dubbo.demo;

public interface DemoService {
    String sayHello(String name);

}

The proejct structure should look like this:

.
├── dubbo-demo-api
│   ├── pom.xml
│   └── src
│       └── main
│           └── java
│               └── org
│                   └── apache
│                       └── dubbo
│                           └── demo
│                               └── DemoService.java

Implement interface in service provider

DemoServiceImpl.java [2]：

package org.apache.dubbo.demo.provider;
import org.apache.dubbo.demo.DemoService;

public class DemoServiceImpl implements DemoService {
    public String sayHello(String name) {
        return "Hello " + name;
    }
}

Exposing service with Spring configuration

provider.xml：

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> 
<beans xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
       xmlns:dubbo="http://dubbo.apache.org/schema/dubbo"
       xmlns="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans"
       xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans/spring-beans-4.3.xsd
       http://dubbo.apache.org/schema/dubbo http://dubbo.apache.org/schema/dubbo/dubbo.xsd">

    <!-- provider's application name, used for tracing dependency relationship -->
    <dubbo:application name="demo-provider"/>
    <!-- use zookeeper registry center to export service -->
    <dubbo:registry address="zookeeper://127.0.0.1:2181"/>
    <!-- use dubbo protocol to export service on port 20880 -->
    <dubbo:protocol name="dubbo" port="20880"/>
    <!-- service implementation, as same as regular local bean -->
    <bean id="demoService" class="org.apache.dubbo.demo.provider.DemoServiceImpl"/>
    <!-- declare the service interface to be exported -->
    <dubbo:service interface="org.apache.dubbo.demo.DemoService" ref="demoService"/>
</beans>

The demo uses multicast as the registry since it is simple and does not require to extra installation. If you prefer a registiry like zookeeper, please check out examples here.

Configure the logging system

Dubbo use log4j as logging system by default, it also support slf4j, Apache Commons Logging, and JUL logging.

Following is a sample configuration:

log4j.properties

###set log levels###
log4j.rootLogger=info, stdout
###output to the console###
log4j.appender.stdout=org.apache.log4j.ConsoleAppender
log4j.appender.stdout.Target=System.out
log4j.appender.stdout.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.stdout.layout.ConversionPattern=[%d{dd/MM/yy hh:mm:ss:sss z}] %t %5p %c{2}: %m%n

Bootstrap the service provider

Provider.java

package org.apache.dubbo.demo.provider;

import org.springframework.context.support.ClassPathXmlApplicationContext;

public class Provider {

    public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
        System.setProperty("java.net.preferIPv4Stack", "true");
        ClassPathXmlApplicationContext context = new ClassPathXmlApplicationContext(new String[]{"META-INF/spring/dubbo-demo-provider.xml"});
        context.start();
        System.out.println("Provider started.");
        System.in.read(); // press any key to exit
    }
}

Finally, the project structure should look like this:

├── dubbo-demo-provider
│   ├── pom.xml
│   └── src
│       └── main
│           ├── java
│           │   └── org
│           │       └── apache
│           │           └── dubbo
│           │               └── demo
│           │                   └── provider
│           │                       ├── DemoServiceImpl.java
│           │                       └── Provider.java
│           └── resources
│               ├── META-INF
│               │   └── spring
│               │       └── dubbo-demo-provider.xml
│               └── log4j.properties

Service consumer

Complete installation steps, see：Consumer demo installation

Using the Spring configuration to reference a remote service

consumer.xml：

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<beans xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
       xmlns:dubbo="http://dubbo.apache.org/schema/dubbo"
       xmlns="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans"
       xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans/spring-beans-4.3.xsd
       http://dubbo.apache.org/schema/dubbo http://dubbo.apache.org/schema/dubbo/dubbo.xsd">

    <!-- consumer's application name, used for tracing dependency relationship (not a matching criterion),
    don't set it same as provider -->
    <dubbo:application name="demo-consumer"/>
    <!-- use zookeeper registry center to discover service -->
    <dubbo:registry address="zookeeper://127.0.0.1:2181"/>
    <!-- generate proxy for the remote service, then demoService can be used in the same way as the
    local regular interface -->
    <dubbo:reference id="demoService" check="false" interface="org.apache.dubbo.demo.DemoService"/>
</beans>

Bootstrap the consumer

Consumer.java：

package org.apache.dubbo.demo.consumer;

import org.springframework.context.support.ClassPathXmlApplicationContext;
import org.apache.dubbo.demo.DemoService;
 
public class Consumer {
    public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
        ClassPathXmlApplicationContext context = new ClassPathXmlApplicationContext(new String[] {"META-INF/spring/dubbo-demo-consumer.xml"});
        context.start();
        // Obtaining a remote service proxy
        DemoService demoService = (DemoService)context.getBean("demoService");
        // Executing remote methods
        String hello = demoService.sayHello("world");
        // Display the call result
        System.out.println(hello);
    }
}

Config the logging system

This is the same as how to config it on provider side.

Finally, the project structure should be look like this:

├── dubbo-demo-consumer
│   ├── pom.xml
│   └── src
│       └── main
│           ├── java
│           │   └── org
│           │       └── apache
│           │           └── dubbo
│           │               └── demo
│           │                   └── consumer
│           │                       └── Consumer.java
│           └── resources
│               ├── META-INF
│               │   └── spring
│               │       └── dubbo-demo-consumer.xml
│               └── log4j.properties