Contributor's guide

Overview

This topic explains how LaunchDarkly SDKs work. It is intended to help anyone create a LaunchDarkly SDK for a new platform from scratch or contribute to an existing SDK implementation.

Our SDKs are all open source, and we encourage pull requests and other contributions from the community.

Algorithms

There are three main components to a LaunchDarkly SDK implementation:

• Receiving feature flag updates
• Evaluating feature flags
• Recording events

Receiving feature flag updates

LaunchDarkly SDKs store all feature flags in memory. SDKs typically receive flag updates asynchronously through our streaming protocol, as is the default case in most SDKs. While LaunchDarkly's various SDKs typically support the same two mechanisms for receiving feature flag updates, their implementation details vary.

The SDKs can use either of the following mechanisms to populate a feature flag store, which is a thread-safe, in-memory map from feature flag keys to feature flag JSON. Evaluating a feature flag is a very lightweight and inexpensive effort and requires no per-evaluation requests to LaunchDarkly's servers.

Server-side SDKs can read flags from the in-memory store and evaluate them using the evaluation algorithm, and client-side SDKs can retrieve pre-evaluated flag values from the in-memory store. To learn more, read Evaluating feature flags.

Receiving flag updates in server-side SDKs

Flag updates are triggered when you make changes on your Flags list, and arrive by one of two mechanisms:

1. Through LaunchDarkly's streaming API: A server-side SDK can subscribe to LaunchDarkly's streaming API at https://stream.launchdarkly.com/all. This call must include an Authorization header with the value ${sdk_key}, where ${sdk_key} is the SDK key the client application passes to the LaunchDarkly client configuration. Our streaming API uses the server-sent events protocol.

2. By polling LaunchDarkly's evaluation API: A server-side SDK can poll https://sdk.launchdarkly.com/sdk/latest-all. This call must include an Authorization header with value ${sdk_key}, where ${sdk_key} is the API key the client application passed to the LaunchDarkly client configuration. Ideally, the SDK implementor should periodically poll this resource. We recommend making one call every thirty seconds; at a minimum, you must throttle the implementation to make at most one call per second. This resource may return caching headers. Use ETags and conditional requests to reduce network transfer when no flags have been modified between requests. This is a common use case, so remember to account for it.

Expose the store itself as an interface so that you can easily implement alternative configurations, for example, a Redis-backed store.

Additionally, server-side SDKs often support a mechanism for receiving feature flag updates without establishing a direct connection to LaunchDarkly. This mechanism relies on the LaunchDarkly Relay Proxy to connect to LaunchDarkly, receive feature flag updates, and keep a persistent feature store up-to-date. When a server-side SDK is configured to operate in this mode, it will defer to the Relay Proxy to update the persistent feature store whenever a feature flag is updated. This mode should be configurable and disabled by default. To learn more, read Using a persistent feature store without connecting to LaunchDarkly.

Receiving flag updates in SDKs using the client-side ID

This section corresponds to a subset of LaunchDarkly's client-side SDKs. To learn more about the client-side ID, read Keys.

Flag updates are triggered when you make changes on your Flags list, and arrive by one of two mechanisms:

1. Through LaunchDarkly's streaming API: LaunchDarkly's streaming API uses the server-sent events protocol.

There are two ways to use this method:

• Using a GET request: subscribe to LaunchDarkly's streaming API at https://clientstream.launchdarkly.com/eval/<clientSideId>/<context>. Replace the clientSideId variable with the LaunchDarkly environment's client-side ID. Replace the context variable with the base64-encoded, URL-safe version of the context's JSON object.
• Using a REPORT request: subscribe to our streaming API at https://clientstream.launchdarkly.com/eval/<clientSideId>. Replace the clientSideId variable with the LaunchDarkly environment's client-side ID. Not all HTTP clients support REPORT requests.

2. By polling LaunchDarkly's evaluation API: The SDK implementor should periodically poll this resource. We recommend making one call every thirty seconds. At a minimum, you must throttle the implementation to make at most one call per second. This resource may return caching headers. Use ETags and conditional requests to reduce network transfer when no flags have been modified between requests. This is a common use case, so remember to account for it.

There are two ways to use this method:

• Using a GET request: poll https://clientsdk.launchdarkly.com/sdk/evalx/<clientSideId>/contexts/<context>. Replace the clientSideId variable with the LaunchDarkly environment's client-side ID. Replace the context variable with the base64-encoded, URL-safe version of the context's JSON object.
• Using a REPORT request: poll https://clientsdk.launchdarkly.com/sdk/evalx/<clientSideId>/contexts. Replace the clientSideId variable with the LaunchDarkly environment's client-side ID. Not all HTTP clients support REPORT requests.

Receiving flag updates in SDKs using the mobile key

This section corresponds to a subset of LaunchDarkly's client-side SDKs. To learn more about the mobile key, read Keys.

Flag updates are triggered when you make changes on your Flags list, and arrive by one of two mechanisms:

1. Through LaunchDarkly's streaming API: LaunchDarkly's streaming API uses the server-sent events protocol. This call must include an Authorization header with the value ${mobile_key}, where ${mobile_key} is the mobile key the client application passes to the LaunchDarkly client configuration.

There are two ways to use this method:

• Using a GET request: subscribe to LaunchDarkly's streaming API at https://clientstream.launchdarkly.com/meval/<context>. Replace the context variable with the base64-encoded, URL-safe version of the context's JSON object.
• Using a REPORT request: subscribe to LaunchDarkly's streaming API at https://clientstream.launchdarkly.com/meval. Not all HTTP clients support REPORT requests.

2. By polling LaunchDarkly's evaluation API: The SDK implementor should periodically poll this resource. We recommend making one call every thirty seconds. At a minimum, you must throttle the implementation to make at most one call per second. Use ETags and conditional requests to reduce network transfer when no flags have been modified between requests. This resource may return caching headers. This call must include an Authorization header with value ${mobile_key}, where ${mobile_key} is the mobile key the client application passed to the LaunchDarkly client configuration.

There are two ways to use this method:

• Using a GET request: poll https://clientsdk.launchdarkly.com/msdk/evalx/contexts/<context>. Replace the context variable with the base64-encoded, URL-safe version of the context's JSON object.
• Using a REPORT request: poll https://clientsdk.launchdarkly.com/msdk/evalx/context. Not all HTTP clients support REPORT requests.

Evaluating feature flags

Server-side and client-side SDKs significantly differ in how they evaluate feature flags. For a high-level explanation, read Flag evaluations.

Flag evaluation in server-side SDKs

To implement the variation method in a server-side SDK, a feature flag is retrieved from the store and evaluated directly in the SDK. To learn more about evaluation rules, read Flag evaluation rules in server-side SDKs.

The LaunchDarkly Go SDK serves as our reference evaluation algorithm.

Flag evaluation in client-side SDKs

As described in Flag evaluations, client-side SDKs do not evaluate flags on their own. LaunchDarkly's services are responsible for evaluating flag rules.

To implement the variation method in a client-side SDK, return the last-known evaluated value from the store for the specified flag key.

Recording events

Most SDKs send the following kinds of events:

• summary events describe a set of individual feature evaluations over an interval.
• feature events include additional feature flag evaluation details for flags used in Experimentation and flags you enable detailed tracking for.
• debug events describe feature flag evaluations when debugging mode is on.
• index and identify events push context data to LaunchDarkly.
• page view and click events are sent by JavaScript-based SDKs when pages are visited or clicked as part of an experiment.
• custom events are sent when an application calls the SDK's track method.
• migration_op events report on metrics specific to migration flags.
• diagnostic events report on how the SDK is configured and operating.

Server-side, client-side, and mobile SDKs must batch and send events to the LaunchDarkly server asynchronously. This is a requirement.

For server-side, client-side, and mobile SDKs, do this by creating a background job that runs every 30 seconds and makes a POST call to /bulk for server-side SDKs, to /events/bulk/{envId} for client-side JavaScript SDKs, and to /mobile/events/bulk for mobile SDKs.

This call must have a Content-Type header set to application/json and must include a JSON body consisting of a list of events. Calls to server-side and mobile SDKs must have an Authorization header set to api_key ${api_key}. Client-side JavaScript SDKs do not need an Authorization header.

LaunchDarkly has separate subdomains for receiving events from mobile SDKs versus server-side and client-side JavaScript SDKs. Mobile SDKs use mobile.launchdarkly.com. Server-side SDKs, edge SDKs, and client-side JavaScript SDKs use events.launchdarkly.com.

On platforms with poor multithreading support like PHP, you may need to get creative. To learn more, read How to Make Async Requests in PHP.

The time between batch calls to the event API should be configurable. The SDK should have a configuration element for the maximum number of events to store between batch calls. If this capacity is exceeded before a batch call, events should be discarded and a warning logged.

Feature and debug events

A feature event should only be generated in one of these scenarios:

• the trackEvents or trackEventsFallthrough attribute on the flag configuration is sent
• the trackEvents attribute on a targeting rule is sent
• the targeting rule or default rule when on has a rollout of kind "experiment" and the variation associated with the event is included in the tracked variations for that rollout

For feature events, the kind attribute should always be "feature". Evaluating flag prerequisites generates one additional feature event per evaluation. These feature events should have the prereqOf attribute set to the originating flag's key. The prereqOf attribute should only be set for flags which are evaluated to determine a prerequisite value.

Depending on your SDK configuration, feature events may include all of the context attribute values instead of the contextKey. In this case, the SDK sends the context attributes in a context property. If feature events include all context attribute values, the SDK will not send a corresponding index event.

For an example and the full list of feature event properties, read Feature events.

The debug event is a variant on the feature event, with two differences. It has kind set to "debug" and it inlines the context value. It is only sent if the debugEventsUntilDate attribute is set for a feature flag and indicates a UNIX epoch timestamp in milliseconds that has not yet elapsed. debug events are not controlled by the trackEvents field.

For an example and the full list of debug event properties, read Debug events.

Index and identify events

SDKs periodically transmit details for the context object used in a feature flag evaluation as reported by the feature event with a separate index event. The SDK will only send index events when a context's attributes change.

The kind for an index event is index. The value of context is the same as described above for a debug event.

For an example and the full list of index event properties, read Index events.

identify events are produced when the client application calls an SDK method called identify. identify events have an identical structure to index events, except the kind is set to identify.

For an example and the full list of identify event properties, read Identify events.

Custom events

SDKs produce custom events when the client application calls the SDK's track method.

Custom events can contain the following optional attributes:

• data can contain any arbitrary JSON.
• metricValue can contain a number.

Depending on your SDK configuration, custom events may include all of the context attribute values instead of the contextKey. In this case, the SDK sends the context attributes in a context property. If custom events include all context attribute values, the SDK will not send a corresponding index event.

For an example and the full list of custom event properties, read Custom events.

Summary events

The SDK is expected to send summary events for every flush interval describing all of the feature evaluations that occurred during that interval. Summary events include all feature evaluations, regardless of whether the trackEvents field was set for individual flags.

The summary event represents a set of feature flag evaluations occurring during an interval defined by startDate and endDate, broken out by feature flag.

The SDK should generate a separate entry in counters for each unique value/version/variation combination encountered during the interval.

The call to /api/events/bulk should contain a JSON list of events.

For an example and the full list of summary event properties, including counters properties, read Summary events.

Migration op events

SDKs that support migration flags send a migration_op event back to LaunchDarkly after each migration operation to record the migration metrics, such as consistency rate, P99 latency, and error rate. To learn more, read the product documentation on Migration flags and the SDK feature documentation on Migrations.

Diagnostic events

diagnostic events are optional events which report on the SDK's configuration and operational behavior. These events are strictly for use by LaunchDarkly's internal teams and are intended to provide insights into how SDKs are operating in the field. Diagnostic events are not used for any customer-facing features nor is the resulting data accessible to customers. Support for diagnostic events varies across LaunchDarkly SDKs.

diagnostic events have two variants:

1. An initial diagnostic event is sent upon SDK initialization. This event summarizes high-level information about the underlying platform such as the operating system name and version and the platform version name and version (e.g. Java 1.8 or Python 3.5). Additionally, this event includes information about how the SDK is configured.
2. A diagnostic event is sent periodically throughout the SDK's lifetime. By default this event is sent every 15 minutes. This event describes the SDK's operational behavior in the time lapsed since the prior diagnostic event's submission. For example, the event includes information about the SDK's attempts to establish a streaming connection to LaunchDarkly and a counter of how many events were most recently sent to LaunchDarkly.

The technical details of how to implement diagnostic events in a LaunchDarkly SDK are beyond the scope of this document. It is not expected that a third-party would implement diagnostic events when building a new SDK from scratch.

Principles

1. Minimize external dependencies and try to use as few external libraries as possible. If all you need from a library is a single utility method, prefer inlining it to importing the library, license permitting. This helps minimize version conflicts if client applications happen to be using the same libraries.
2. Be consistent with the conventions and style of the target language. For example, if most libraries in that language are written in snake case, use snake case. If camel case is standard, use camel case. Target language consistency trumps consistency with other LaunchDarkly SDKs.
3. Use the target language's preferred module and package layout. For example, jar files for Java and gems for Ruby.
4. Publish libraries to the most popular module hosting service for the target language. For example, the Java SDK is published to Maven central. The Python SDK is published to PyPi. .Net should be published by NuGet. Try not to publish to a nonstandard location that requires clients to customize their project build definitions. For example, don't use Bintray.
5. If there's a platform standard for generating and publishing documentation, use it. For example, the Java SDK includes Javadoc comments and a build target to produce Javadoc pages.
6. All SDKs should be open sourced and published with the Apache 2.0 license.
7. Follow semantic versioning guidelines for SDK versions.
8. Write unit tests using a standard testing framework.
9. In statically typed languages, make the SDK as type-safe as possible.
10. Use best practices with respect to logging. A proper logging package should be used, and log entries should have appropriate log levels. Simply logging output to standard out is probably not appropriate.
11. Use best practices with respect to error handling. Be extremely defensive and assume anything can fail. For variation calls, use a top-level catch-all error handler that returns the default value if any exceptions or unexpected errors occur. Log when the default value is returned because of an exception or unexpected error.
12. Make the SDK thread-safe. SDKs should not be expected to have to introduce locking around API calls for thread-safety. Furthermore, the LDClient instance itself should be a thread-safe singleton. Clients should be expected to instantiate one LDClient for the lifetime of their application.
13. All SDK calls to the LaunchDarkly REST API with an entity body should have the Content-Type header set to application/json.
14. All timestamps should be sent as UNIX time in milliseconds. Event timestamps should reflect as nearly as possible the time that the event was created, not the time that the event was sent.
15. The HTTP client used in the SDK should have reasonable timeouts set by default. If supported by the client library, separate connection and read timeouts should be specified. A reasonable but conservative set of default values is one second for connection timeouts and two seconds for read timeouts.

Common pitfalls

We've observed a few common mistakes in integrating the LaunchDarkly SDK at customer sites. It's helpful for the SDKs to introduce specific logging around these errors and handle them as gracefully as possible:

• Passing null or the language equivalent as the context key, or omitting the key property altogether. SDKs should log this at error level and return the default value.
• Including a trailing slash in the base URL of a custom config object. Example: https://sdk.launchdarkly.com/, which when appended with /api, yields https://sdk.launchdarkly.com//api. SDKs should deal with this by trimming trailing slashes off of custom base URL parameters.

More resources

Here are some examples from other LaunchDarkly SDK implementations:

• Java Server SDK and the corresponding Javadoc
• Python Server SDK

The LaunchDarkly REST API documentation may be helpful as well.