Working with Protobuf Types

Since the Google Ads API uses Protobuf as its default payload format, it's important to understand a few Protobuf conventions and types when working with the API.

Optional fields

Many fields in the Google Ads API are marked as optional. This lets you distinguish between cases where the field has an empty value, versus the server did not send back a value for the field. These fields behave like regular fields, except they also provide additional methods to clear the field and to check if the field is set.

For example, the Name field of the Campaign object is marked as optional. So you can use the following methods to work with this field.

// Get the name.
string name = campaign.Name;

// Set the name.
campaign.Name = name;

// Check if the campaign object has the name field set.
bool hasName = campaign.HasName();

// Clear the name field. Use this method to exclude Name field from
// being sent to the server in a subsequent API call.
campaign.ClearName();

// Set the campaign to empty string value. This value will be
// sent to the server if you use this object in a subsequent API call.
campaign.Name = "";

// This will throw a runtime error. Use ClearName() instead.
campaign.Name = null;

Repeated types

A field array is represented in the Google Ads API as a readonly RepeatedField.

An example is a campaign's url_custom_parameters field being a repeated field, so it's represented as a readonly RepeatedField<CustomParameter> in the .NET client library.

The RepeatedField implements the IList<T> interface.

There are two ways to populate a RepeatedField field.

Older C# version: Add values using AddRange method

An example is given below.

Campaign campaign = new Campaign()
{
    ResourceName = ResourceNames.Campaign(customerId, campaignId),
    Status = CampaignStatus.Paused,
};

// Add values to UrlCustomParameters using AddRange method.
campaign.UrlCustomParameters.AddRange(new CustomParameter[]
{
    new CustomParameter { Key = "season", Value = "christmas" },
    new CustomParameter { Key = "promocode", Value = "NY123" }
});

Newer C# versions: Use collection initializer syntax

Campaign campaign = new Campaign()
{
    ResourceName = ResourceNames.Campaign(customerId, campaignId),
    Status = CampaignStatus.Paused,
    // Directly initialize the field.
    UrlCustomParameters =
    {
        new CustomParameter { Key = "season", Value = "christmas" },
        new CustomParameter { Key = "promocode", Value = "NY123" }
    }
};

CustomParameter parameters = new UrlCustomParameters[]
{
    new CustomParameter { Key = "season", Value = "christmas" },
    new CustomParameter { Key = "promocode", Value = "NY123" }
}

Campaign campaign1 = new Campaign()
{
    ResourceName = ResourceNames.Campaign(customerId, campaignId),
    Status = CampaignStatus.Paused,
    // Initialize from an existing array.
    UrlCustomParameters = { parameters }
};

Campaign campaign = new Campaign()
{
    ResourceName = ResourceNames.Campaign(customerId, campaignId),
    Status = CampaignStatus.Paused,
    UrlCustomParameters = { ara}
    {
        new CustomParameter { Key = "season", Value = "christmas" },
        new CustomParameter { Key = "promocode", Value = "NY123" }
    }
};

OneOf types

Some fields in the Google Ads API are marked as OneOf fields, meaning that the field can hold different types but only one value at a given time. OneOf fields are similar to union type in C.

The .NET library implements OneOf fields by providing one property for each type of value that can be held in a OneOf field, and all the properties updating a shared class field.

For example, the campaign's campaign_bidding_strategy is marked as a OneOf field. This class is implemented as follows (code simplified for brevity):

public sealed partial class Campaign : pb::IMessage<Campaign>
{
    object campaignBiddingStrategy_ = null;
    CampaignBiddingStrategyOneofCase campaignBiddingStrategyCase_;

    public ManualCpc ManualCpc
    {
        get
        {
            return campaignBiddingStrategyCase_ == CampaignBiddingStrategyOneofCase.ManualCpc ?
                (ManualCpc) campaignBiddingStrategy_ : null;
        }
        set
        {
            campaignBiddingStrategy_ = value;
            campaignBiddingStrategyCase_ = CampaignBiddingStrategyOneofCase.ManualCpc;
        }
    }

    public ManualCpm ManualCpm
    {
        get
        {
            return campaignBiddingStrategyCase_ == CampaignBiddingStrategyOneofCase.ManualCpm ?
                (ManualCpm) campaignBiddingStrategy_ : null;
        }
        set
        {
            campaignBiddingStrategy_ = value;
            campaignBiddingStrategyCase_ = CampaignBiddingStrategyOneofCase.ManualCpm;
        }
    }

    public CampaignBiddingStrategyOneofCase CampaignBiddingStrategyCase
    {
        get { return campaignBiddingStrategyCase_; }
    }
}

Since OneOf properties share storage, one assignment can overwrite a previous assignment, leading to subtle bugs. For example,

Campaign campaign = new Campaign()
{
    ManualCpc = new ManualCpc()
    {
        EnhancedCpcEnabled = true
    },
    ManualCpm = new ManualCpm()
    {

    }
};

In this case, campaign.ManualCpc is now null since initializing the campaign.ManualCpm field overwrites the previous initialization for campaign.ManualCpc.

Conversion to other formats

You can easily convert protobuf objects to JSON format and vice versa. This is useful when building systems that need to interface with other systems that require data in text-based formats like JSON or XML.

GoogleAdsRow row = new GoogleAdsRow()
{
    Campaign = new Campaign()
    {
        Id = 123,
        Name = "Campaign 1",
        ResourceName = ResourceNames.Campaign(1234567890, 123)
    }
};
// Serialize to JSON and back.
string json = JsonFormatter.Default.Format(row);
row = GoogleAdsRow.Parser.ParseJson(json);

You can also serialize an object to bytes and back. Binary serialization is more memory and storage efficient than JSON format.

GoogleAdsRow row = new GoogleAdsRow()
{
    Campaign = new Campaign()
    {
        Id = 123,
        Name = "Campaign 1",
        ResourceName = ResourceNames.Campaign(1234567890, 123)
    }
};
// Serialize to bytes and back.
byte[] bytes = row.ToByteArray();
row = GoogleAdsRow.Parser.ParseFrom(bytes);