Confusion with "Trigger background functions" Beta designation

[David DeRemer]

Hello,

We have a client interested in using Firestore and specifically Firestore-triggered Firebase Functions. However, they while evaluating it, they raised questions about the "beta" designation and limitations as defined here: https://firebase.google.com/docs/functions/firestore-events

As we were researching the beta status to help them make this decision, we found ourselves confused (and we've been working with these products for years) and wanted to:

a) ask for help clarifying, and

b) suggest some refinement of documentation to help future devs

For more context...

For the overall Firebase Functions documentation, it would appear that Firebase Functions itself is NOT in beta. For instance there is no mention of beta status here: https://firebase.google.com/docs/functions

I keenly remember this transition: https://firebase.google.com/docs/functions/beta-v1-diff and to newcomers this would certainly seem to indicate it is out of beta. But really that is just the Firebase SDK.

Firestore itself also is in GA (correct?)

However, when we go here: https://firebase.google.com/docs/functions/firestore-events there is a whole section about https://firebase.google.com/docs/functions/firestore-events#limitations_and_guarantees that says "Cloud Firestore triggers for Cloud Functions is a beta feature with some known limitations:" And also in the left menu, all the background triggers have a "B" symbol next to them.

Adding to this confusion is that if we go here: https://firebase.google.com/docs/functions/database-events and do a find for "beta" on the page we get nothing. On the other hand if we go here: https://cloud.google.com/functions/docs/calling/realtime-database there is a clear call out that it is in beta.

Another deviation of information is that if you look at your list of functions in the firebase console there is no indication of them being beta, yet if you look at the same list in the Google Cloud Console we see "(Beta)" next to our Auth, RTDB, and Firestore triggered functions in the "Trigger" column. But interestingly we do not see that next to our storage or pubsub triggered functions even though they have the "B" on the pages mentioned above.

To be clear, I know how hard docs are to keep current and clear (let alone at the scale of GCP!) We love thesse products and advocate for them daily, so we wanted to share the above as it illustrates some of the confusion a new engineering team might face when evaluating if these tools are acceptable for their company. We'd hate to see team turn away from these products for the wrong reasons.

In summary, this is what I think to be true:

Firestore: GA

Firebase Functions SDK: GA (or at least not beta)

HTTP-triggers: GA

Background-triggers (e.g., Firestore, RTDB, Pubsub, etc.): Beta

Seem right?

Thanks!

[Jamie Niemasik]

Hi David,

Yes, the GA/beta situation is exactly as you describe at the end. Nice detective work.

I agree that it is confusing. Although we're not there yet, I am looking forward to a future when every step is GA and the story will be much clearer.

All the best,

Jamie

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[David DeRemer]

Hi Jamie,

Thanks for the response and thanks for the confirmation of our assumptions.

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