Package version numbers for protobuf and gRPC (for Python)

[Jens Troeger]

Hello,

I’m a little confused by the various version numbers used by different packages, and would like to find some clarity as to which versions can go together and which don’t:

• protocol buffers exist in a version 2 and a version 3
• the current protobuf release is v23.3
• the current Python package is v4.23.3 

Then there is the gRPC side of things:

• gRPC is currently in v1.56.0 (I suspect the version applies across languages)
• gRPC tools as well (different packages built from the same repo)

Not sure if these are semantic versions or not.

How does updating the protobuf package(s) interplay with updating the gRPC packages? Or — which protobuf works with with gRPC version?

And how does updating the packages impact existing implementation and compiled code?

Any insight would be greatly appreciated! Thank you,

Jens

[Matthew Fowles Kulukundis]

Jens~

Speaking for protobuf, these are semantic versions.  The best practice is to always regenerate your code.  The official guarantees provided for using stale generated code are documented at https://protobuf.dev/support/cross-version-runtime-guarantee/.

gRPC is usually validated to work with a particular release of protobuf and you would be well advised to use the release that it recommends.  I do not know what official guarantees they provide.

Cheers,

Matt

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[Jens Troeger]

Thank you, Matthew, that helps!

Can I assume that Python’s protobuf package v4.23.3 correlates with Protocol Buffers language v23.3?

I wasn’t able to find the documentation for gRPC version ⇔ Protocol Buffers version yet, so I asked in the grpc-io group.

Then there is the question of Google API common protos (and its Python package), and which version those work with… 🤔 Are you familiar with that?

Cheers,

Jens

[Matthew Fowles Kulukundis]

Jens~

Yes, we keep the numbers in sync so that python 4.23.3 is protoc 23.3 (and similar for all other languages).

Sorry, I don't know the version that is used by the Google common API python package.

Matt

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