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Doing a Transformation

The Transformation object in TriggerMesh defines a set of operations that are sequentially applied to incoming CloudEvents. In this guide, we will create a simple Bridge with an event producer and a transformation to see the declarative syntax that is used for modifying events.

Tip

You can verify that the API is available with the following command:

$ kubectl get crd transformations.flow.triggermesh.io
NAME                                  CREATED AT
transformations.flow.triggermesh.io   2021-10-06T09:01:40Z

You can also explore the API specification with: 

$ kubectl explain transformation

Let's create all the required objects:

  • The sockeye target which serves as an event display.
  • The PingSource which serves as an event producer.
  • The Transformation to modify the produced events.

Event display

First of all, we need to have a tool to see the transformed events. Create a sockeye service by saving the following YAML manifest in a file called sockeye.yaml and applying it to your Kubernetes cluster:

apiVersion: serving.knative.dev/v1
kind: Service
metadata:
  name: sockeye
spec:
  template:
    spec:
      containers:
        - image: docker.io/n3wscott/sockeye:v0.7.0@sha256:e603d8494eeacce966e57f8f508e4c4f6bebc71d095e3f5a0a1abaf42c5f0e48

kubectl apply -f sockeye.yaml

Open the web interface in a browser at the URL that you find with the following command:

$ kubectl get ksvc sockeye -o=jsonpath='{.status.url}'

Events producer

Next, we need to create a PingSource to produce CloudEvents by saving the following YAML manifests in a file and applying it to your Kubernetes cluster with kubectl apply:

apiVersion: sources.knative.dev/v1
kind: PingSource
metadata:
  name: ps-transformation-demo
spec:
  schedule: "*/1 * * * *"
  contentType: "application/json"
  data: '{
    "First Name": "Alice",
    "Last Name": "Wonderland",
    "Date of birth": {
      "year": 1955,
      "month": 1,
      "day" : 23
    },
    "Married": true,
    "Children":
    [
        {"Name": "Martin", "Year of birth": 1980},
        {"Name": "Margaret", "Year of birth": 1983}
    ],
    "Mobile phone": null
  }'
  sink:
    ref:
      apiVersion: flow.triggermesh.io/v1alpha1
      kind: Transformation
      name: trn-transformation-demo

Transformation

And finally the transformation object that will receive CloudEvents from the PingSource defined above, apply its operations and forward modified events to the sockeye service:

apiVersion: flow.triggermesh.io/v1alpha1
kind: Transformation
metadata:
  name: trn-transformation-demo
spec:
  sink:
    ref:
      apiVersion: serving.knative.dev/v1
      kind: Service
      name: sockeye

  context:
  - operation: store
    paths:
    - key: $time
      value: time
    - key: $id
      value: id
  - operation: add
    paths:
    - key: id
      value: $person-$id
    - key: type
      value: io.triggermesh.transformation.pingsource

  data:
  - operation: store
    paths:
    - key: $person
      value: First Name
  - operation: add
    paths:
    - key: event.ID
      value: $id
    - key: event.time
      value: $time
  - operation: shift
    paths:
    - key: Date of birth:birthday
    - key: First Name:firstname
    - key: Last Name:lastname
  - operation: delete
    paths:
    - key: Mobile phone
    - key: Children[1].Year of birth
    - value: Martin

Once created with kubectl apply verify that the transformation is ready:

$ kubectl get transformation -w
NAME                      ADDRESS                                                   READY   REASON
trn-transformation-demo   http://trn-transformation-demo.sebgoa.svc.cluster.local   True

If all the components of the Bridge are ready, the sockeye web interface will start showing modified events shortly:

transformed event

You will notice that the CloudEvent attributes have beeen modified according to the context section in the specification of the Transformation object. The event type was modified and the id was prepended with the string Alice.

The payload was also transformed according to the data section of the Transformation object. For example the mobile phone was deleted, a key event was added and a few keys were shifted: "Date of Birth" became "birthday".

Play with your Transformation as Code

You can play around by modifying the Transformation object and re-applying it with kubectl. This gives you a declarative event transformer which you can manage with your GitOps workflow.

More about Transformations

Learn more about Transformations on the Concepts page.