[RFC] Support for native-image compilation

[sapessi]

• Implementations: Spring 5.3.x / Spring Boot 2

Scenario

As the Spring framework adds support for GraalVM's native image tool, we should explore making it easy to compile SpringBoot applications and execute them as a custom runtime in AWS Lambda

This issue serves as a tracker for this project to make design decisions and collect feedback on the implementation

[urmichm]

Totally support this issue! @sapessi if you are interested I might help to create a project for GraalVM and Springboot with MVC controllers.

[deki]

Please check https://catalog.workshops.aws/java-on-aws-lambda/en-US/01-migration/03-alternatives/graalvm for an example. Will get that added to the docs.

[fsomme2s]

Now that we have Spring Boot 3 Support (see #487, which I tested and it works really nice so far! Awesome work!), maybe it's time to revive this issue?

I can use Spring Boot Native to create Custom Images; I can use the serverless-java-container lib to "bridge" Api Gateway Events into Spring ... But I can't get my head around how to combine these two.

Is this already possible? Or would it need some kind of special Custom Runtime "Event Loop" thing, similar to this ? (That would call SpringBootLambdaContainerHandler.proxy(...) when it polls a new event)

[lenis0012]

@fsomme2s One critical difference between native image support for spring via "Spring Cloud Function" and aws-serverless-java-container is the runtime.

You can use spring boot 3 to compile to a native image, create a custom runtime and use that to make a simple function with the code already provided by Spring Cloud Function. But this will not correctly proxy API Gateway requests.

The reason why aws-serverless-container does not work out of the box is that it assumes to be running in a java runtime. When this happens, the invocation is handled by the AWS Platform which executes a java method somewhere. This does not work with a custom runtime where you have to listen for invocations by calling out to an API.

The SAM template in the spring boot 3 example uses the following for runtime invocation:

Handler: com.amazonaws.serverless.sample.springboot3.StreamLambdaHandler::handleRequest

From my understanding, this is the part that has to be changed.

What does work is the custom runtime integration that is provided by Spring Cloud Function's AWS adapter. (spring-cloud-starter-function-adapter-aws). Similar logic would have to be integrated into this project to make it work with native compilation. And a different SAM template is required that specifies a custom runtime. I might be missing something but from my understanding that's what has to happen.

I don't think it would be too difficult to create a runtime inializer inspired by CustomRuntimeInitializer and CustomRuntimeEventLoop.

However, it seems that it is quite possible Spring Cloud Function already supports this since very recently. I haven't confirmed but there is https://github.com/spring-cloud/spring-cloud-function/blob/main/spring-cloud-function-adapters/spring-cloud-function-adapter-aws-web/src/main/java/org/springframework/cloud/function/adapter/aws/web/WebProxyInvoker.java

[babaksd]

@deki I'm having trouble integrating aws-serverless-java-container-springboot3 with Graalvm and a custom lambda runtime/handler. Has anyone successfully managed to do this? Is the anyway to make it work?

[deki]

Hey @babaksd, we are aware. @olegz is currently working on that and we'll include it in the next release (current plan is to have that end of this month).

[babaksd]

@deki That's great, Thank you for the amazing work!

[deki]

739 has been merged and will be part of the next release. We've also added a sample: https://github.com/aws/serverless-java-container/tree/main/samples/springboot3/pet-store-native