Crate bson[−][src]

Expand description

BSON, short for Binary JSON, is a binary-encoded serialization of JSON-like documents. Like JSON, BSON supports the embedding of documents and arrays within other documents and arrays. BSON also contains extensions that allow representation of data types that are not part of the JSON spec. For example, BSON has a datetime type and a binary data type.

// JSON equivalent
{"hello": "world"}

// BSON encoding
\x16\x00\x00\x00                   // total document size
\x02                               // 0x02 = type String
hello\x00                          // field name
\x06\x00\x00\x00world\x00          // field value
\x00                               // 0x00 = type EOO ('end of object')

BSON is the primary data representation for MongoDB, and this crate is used in the mongodb driver crate in its API and implementation.

For more information about BSON itself, see bsonspec.org.

Installation

Requirements

Rust 1.48+

Importing

This crate is available on crates.io. To use it in your application, simply add it to your project’s Cargo.toml.

[dependencies]
bson = "2.0.0"

Note that if you are using bson through the mongodb crate, you do not need to specify it in your Cargo.toml, since the mongodb crate already re-exports it.

Feature Flags

Feature	Description	Extra dependencies	Default
`chrono-0_4`	Enable support for v0.4 of the `chrono` crate in the public API.	n/a	no
`uuid-0_8`	Enable support for v0.8 of the `uuid` crate in the public API.	n/a	no

BSON values

Many different types can be represented as a BSON value, including 32-bit and 64-bit signed integers, 64 bit floating point numbers, strings, datetimes, embedded documents, and more. To see a full list of possible BSON values, see the BSON specification. The various possible BSON values are modeled in this crate by the Bson enum.

Creating `Bson` instances

Bson values can be instantiated directly or via the bson! macro:

use bson::{bson, Bson};

let string = Bson::String("hello world".to_string());
let int = Bson::Int32(5);
let array = Bson::Array(vec![Bson::Int32(5), Bson::Boolean(false)]);

let string: Bson = "hello world".into();
let int: Bson = 5i32.into();

let string = bson!("hello world");
let int = bson!(5);
let array = bson!([5, false]);

bson! has supports both array and object literals, and it automatically converts any values specified to Bson, provided they are Into<Bson>.

`Bson` value unwrapping

Bson has a number of helper methods for accessing the underlying native Rust types. These helpers can be useful in circumstances in which the specific type of a BSON value is known ahead of time.

e.g.:

use bson::{bson, Bson};

let value = Bson::Int32(5);
let int = value.as_i32(); // Some(5)
let bool = value.as_bool(); // None

let value = bson!([true]);
let array = value.as_array(); // Some(&Vec<Bson>)

BSON documents

BSON documents are ordered maps of UTF-8 encoded strings to BSON values. They are logically similar to JSON objects in that they can contain subdocuments, arrays, and values of several different types. This crate models BSON documents via the Document struct.

Creating `Document`s

Documents can be created directly either from a byte reader containing BSON data or via the doc! macro:

use bson::{doc, Document};
use std::io::Read;

let mut bytes = hex::decode("0C0000001069000100000000").unwrap();
let doc = Document::from_reader(&mut bytes.as_slice()).unwrap(); // { "i": 1 }

let doc = doc! {
   "hello": "world",
   "int": 5,
   "subdoc": { "cat": true },
};

doc! works similarly to bson!, except that it always returns a Document rather than a Bson.

`Document` member access

Document has a number of methods on it to facilitate member access:

use bson::doc;

let doc = doc! {
   "string": "string",
   "bool": true,
   "i32": 5,
   "doc": { "x": true },
};

// attempt get values as untyped Bson
let none = doc.get("asdfadsf"); // None
let value = doc.get("string"); // Some(&Bson::String("string"))

// attempt to get values with explicit typing
let string = doc.get_str("string"); // Ok("string")
let subdoc = doc.get_document("doc"); // Some(Document({ "x": true }))
let error = doc.get_i64("i32"); // Err(...)

Modeling BSON with strongly typed data structures

While it is possible to work with documents and BSON values directly, it will often introduce a lot of boilerplate for verifying the necessary keys are present and their values are the correct types. serde provides a powerful way of mapping BSON data into Rust data structures largely automatically, removing the need for all that boilerplate.

e.g.:

use serde::{Deserialize, Serialize};
use bson::{bson, Bson};

#[derive(Serialize, Deserialize)]
struct Person {
    name: String,
    age: i32,
    phones: Vec<String>,
}

// Some BSON input data as a `Bson`.
let bson_data: Bson = bson!({
    "name": "John Doe",
    "age": 43,
    "phones": [
        "+44 1234567",
        "+44 2345678"
    ]
});

// Deserialize the Person struct from the BSON data, automatically
// verifying that the necessary keys are present and that they are of
// the correct types.
let mut person: Person = bson::from_bson(bson_data).unwrap();

// Do things just like with any other Rust data structure.
println!("Redacting {}'s record.", person.name);
person.name = "REDACTED".to_string();

// Get a serialized version of the input data as a `Bson`.
let redacted_bson = bson::to_bson(&person).unwrap();

Any types that implement Serialize and Deserialize can be used in this way. Doing so helps separate the “business logic” that operates over the data from the (de)serialization logic that translates the data to/from its serialized form. This can lead to more clear and concise code that is also less error prone.

Working with datetimes

The BSON format includes a datetime type, which is modeled in this crate by the DateTime struct, and the Serialize and Deserialize implementations for this struct produce and parse BSON datetimes when serializing to or deserializing from BSON. The popular crate chrono also provides a DateTime type, but its Serialize and Deserialize implementations operate on strings instead, so when using it with BSON, the BSON datetime type is not used. To work around this, the chrono-0_4 feature flag can be enabled. This flag exposes a number of convenient conversions between bson::DateTime and chrono::DateTime, including the serde_helpers::chrono_datetime_as_bson_datetime serde helper, which can be used to (de)serialize chrono::DateTimes to/from BSON datetimes, and the From<chrono::DateTime> implementation for Bson, which allows chrono::DateTime values to be used in the doc! and bson! macros.

e.g.

use serde::{Serialize, Deserialize};
use bson::doc;

#[derive(Serialize, Deserialize)]
struct Foo {
    // serializes as a BSON datetime.
    date_time: bson::DateTime,

    // serializes as an RFC 3339 / ISO-8601 string.
    chrono_datetime: chrono::DateTime<chrono::Utc>,

    // serializes as a BSON datetime.
    // this requires the "chrono-0_4" feature flag
    #[serde(with = "bson::serde_helpers::chrono_datetime_as_bson_datetime")]
    chrono_as_bson: chrono::DateTime<chrono::Utc>,
}

// this automatic conversion also requires the "chrono-0_4" feature flag
let query = doc! {
    "created_at": chrono::Utc::now(),
};

Working with UUIDs

The BSON format does not contain a dedicated UUID type, though it does have a “binary” type which has UUID subtypes. Accordingly, this crate provides a Binary struct which models this binary type and serializes to and deserializes from it. The popular uuid crate does provide a UUID type (Uuid), though its Serialize and Deserialize implementations operate on strings, so when using it with BSON, the BSON binary type will not be used. To facilitate the conversion between Uuid values and BSON binary values, the uuid-0_8 feature flag can be enabled. This flag exposes a number of convenient conversions from Uuid, including the serde_helpers::uuid_as_binary serde helper, which can be used to (de)serialize Uuids to/from BSON binaries with the UUID subtype, and the From<Uuid> implementation for Bson, which allows Uuid values to be used in the doc! and bson! macros.

e.g.

use serde::{Serialize, Deserialize};
use bson::doc;

#[derive(Serialize, Deserialize)]
struct Foo {
    // serializes as a String.
    uuid: uuid::Uuid,

    // serializes as a BSON binary with subtype 4.
    // this requires the "uuid-0_8" feature flag
    #[serde(with = "bson::serde_helpers::uuid_as_binary")]
    uuid_as_bson: uuid::Uuid,
}

// this automatic conversion also requires the "uuid-0_8" feature flag
let query = doc! {
    "uuid": uuid::Uuid::new_v4(),
};

Minimum supported Rust version (MSRV)

The MSRV for this crate is currently 1.48.0. This will be rarely be increased, and if it ever is, it will only happen in a minor or major version release.