Overview

The Buf CLI is a helpful tool for managing Protobuf schemas. It offers various features, including code generation, breaking change detection, linting, and formatting, to assist with Protobuf development and maintenance. It works with your choice of plugins and languages and gives you access to a vast library of certified plugins in the Buf Schema Registry.

Buf CLI commands

The links below go to detailed usage guides. See the Buf CLI reference for complete options and flags for each command.

• build: Build Protobuf files into a Buf image (key to many other buf operations)
• generate: Generate code stubs from Protobuf files using protoc plugins
• breaking: Verify no breaking changes have been made, to guard against compatibility issues
• lint and format: Lint and format your Protobuf files according to best practice and your org rules
• curl: Test your APIs by invoking an RPC endpoint, similar to using cURL
• convert: Convert a message from binary to JSON or vice versa—useful when debugging or testing
• mod, registry, push, and export: Manage your repositories in the Buf Schema Registry

Configuration

The Buf CLI interacts with several configuration files depending on the operation.

• buf.yaml
• buf.lock
• buf.gen.yaml
• buf.work.yaml

buf.yaml

buf.yaml is used to define a module. It's the primary configuration file, and is responsible for the module's name, dependencies, and lint and breaking configuration.

buf.lock

buf.lock contains the module's dependency manifest, and represents a single, reproducible build of your module's dependencies.

buf.gen.yaml

buf.gen.yaml is used to define a local plugin template that works directly with the buf generate command to generate code stubs from your Protobuf files.

buf.work.yaml

buf.work.yaml is used to define a workspace, which is an advanced local development feature. Workspaces make it possible to consolidate one or more modules into a single buildable unit. They also allow users to run buf operations across multiple modules with a single execution (such as buf lint).

Default configuration

The default configuration location depends on the input. If buf is executed with an input that contains buf.{mod,lock,work} files, those files are used for the given operation. Running buf lint, for example, would use the lint configuration found in the inputs buf.yaml, if it exists.

If a buf.yaml file is not contained in the input, buf operates as if there is a buf.yaml file with the default values. The buf.{lock,work} files do not have a default value.

It's important to note that, unlike the buf.{mod,lock,work} files, the buf.gen.yaml file found in the input is not used by default. Instead, the buf.gen.yaml found in the current working directory is used by default. You can manually specify the buf.gen.yaml file to use with the --template flag, which is explained further in the generate usage. The buf.gen.yaml file does not have a default value, so running buf generate without a buf.gen.yaml file in the current working directory yields an error (unless a --template is explicitly specified).

Configuration override

Many of the buf commands support a --config flag that's used to override the buf.yaml configuration with a file path or direct JSON or YAML data. This is useful for situations where you may want to specify all options via the command line, for example with Bazel integrations and/or when using the protoc plugins.

All commands have one or more --.*config flags that control this behavior. For example:

• buf build --config specifies the config for the source input.
• buf lint --config specifies the config for the source or Buf image input.
• buf breaking --config specifies the config for the source or image input.
• buf breaking --against-config specifies the config for the source or image input to compare against.

The value of this flag is interpreted as follows:

• If the value ends in .json, this is interpreted to be a local path to a JSON file.
• If the value ends in .yaml, this is interpreted to be a local path to a YAML file.
• Otherwise, this is interpreted to be either JSON or YAML data, which is directly parsed.

For example:

# Read the JSON file foo/bar.json.
buf lint --config foo/bar.json

# Read the YAML file foo/bar.yaml.
buf lint --config foo/bar.yaml

# Use the given JSON data.
# This results in only using the ENUM_NO_ALLOW_ALIAS lint rule for linting.
buf lint --config '{"version":"v1","lint":{"use":["ENUM_NO_ALLOW_ALIAS"]}}'