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Serde Framework

Serde is a generic serialization and deserialization framework for otavia based on Buffer. It provides a unified interface for all serialization tools, designed to work efficiently with otavia's buffer management system.

Design Motivation​

Most serialization frameworks in the Scala ecosystem serialize to java.nio.ByteBuffer or Array[Byte]. This does not work well with otavia's Buffer system — it requires an extra memory copy and makes it difficult to leverage memory pools.

Serde[T] uses Buffer as the serialization target, enabling:

  • Zero-copy operation with AdaptiveBuffer
  • Direct use of memory pools
  • Flexible Buffer implementations (heap, direct, file-based)

Serde Interface​

trait Serde[T] {
  def serialize(output: Buffer, value: T): Unit
  def deserialize(input: Buffer): T
}

Supported Formats​

JSON​

JSON serialization/deserialization using the Serde[?] interface.

Protocol Buffers​

Protocol Buffers serialization/deserialization with efficient binary encoding directly to/from Buffer.

Integration with Channel Pipeline​

Serde integrates naturally with the codec module's Message2ByteEncoder and Byte2MessageDecoder:

class MyEncoder(serde: Serde[MyMessage]) extends Message2ByteEncoder[MyMessage] {
  override protected def encode(ctx: ChannelHandlerContext, msg: MyMessage, out: AdaptiveBuffer): Unit = {
    serde.serialize(out, msg)
  }
}

class MyDecoder(serde: Serde[MyMessage]) extends Byte2MessageDecoder[MyMessage] {
  override protected def decode(ctx: ChannelHandlerContext, input: AdaptiveBuffer): MyMessage = {
    serde.deserialize(input)
  }
}

This enables zero-copy message serialization in the Channel Pipeline, with data flowing directly between the network and the Actor's message types.