Installation

How to get a working parsec binary on disk.

Prerequisites

Go 1.26.1 or newer. Parsec uses generics, structured logging, and the modern slog API; older toolchains will not build.
A POSIX shell. The bootstrap message uses standard environment variables; nothing exotic.
No CGO. The Makefile sets CGO_ENABLED=0 and treats any new C-toolchain dependency as a build failure. You do not need a C compiler.

Verify your toolchain:

go version
# go version go1.26.1 darwin/arm64

Install with `go install`

The fastest path. Drops the binary in $(go env GOBIN) (or $(go env GOPATH)/bin if GOBIN is unset):

go install github.com/frankbardon/parsec/cmd/parsec@latest

Confirm:

parsec --version
# parsec version dev

The dev string is the default ldflags version stamp. Tagged releases substitute the tag at build time.

Build from source

Clone the repo and use the Makefile. The resulting binary lands at bin/parsec:

git clone https://github.com/frankbardon/parsec.git
cd parsec
make build
./bin/parsec --version

make build runs:

go build -trimpath -ldflags="-s -w" -o bin/parsec ./cmd/parsec

-trimpath strips local build paths from the binary; -ldflags="-s -w" drops the DWARF debug info and symbol table to shrink the artifact. CGO is disabled by the Makefile.

Run the test and lint targets

The same Makefile drives the rest of the development loop:

make test       # go test ./...
make lint       # go vet + staticcheck
make cover      # coverage profile
make docs       # mdbook build (requires mdbook on PATH)

make lint shells out to staticcheck via go run; it does not need a separate install step.

What you should do next

Walk through the quick start to boot the broker and publish your first message.
Skim the channel naming convention — every surface enforces it, so it pays to internalize early.
If you intend to embed Parsec, jump to the library overview.

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