+
+`Any` contains an arbitrary serialized protocol buffer message along with a
+URL that describes the type of the serialized message.
+
+Protobuf library provides support to pack/unpack Any values in the form
+of utility functions or additional generated methods of the Any type.
+
+Example 1: Pack and unpack a message in C++.
+
+ Foo foo = ...;
+ Any any;
+ any.PackFrom(foo);
+ ...
+ if (any.UnpackTo(&foo)) {
+ ...
+ }
+
+Example 2: Pack and unpack a message in Java.
+
+ Foo foo = ...;
+ Any any = Any.pack(foo);
+ ...
+ if (any.is(Foo.class)) {
+ foo = any.unpack(Foo.class);
+ }
+ // or ...
+ if (any.isSameTypeAs(Foo.getDefaultInstance())) {
+ foo = any.unpack(Foo.getDefaultInstance());
+ }
+
+ Example 3: Pack and unpack a message in Python.
+
+ foo = Foo(...)
+ any = Any()
+ any.Pack(foo)
+ ...
+ if any.Is(Foo.DESCRIPTOR):
+ any.Unpack(foo)
+ ...
+
+ Example 4: Pack and unpack a message in Go
+
+ foo := &pb.Foo{...}
+ any, err := anypb.New(foo)
+ if err != nil {
+ ...
+ }
+ ...
+ foo := &pb.Foo{}
+ if err := any.UnmarshalTo(foo); err != nil {
+ ...
+ }
+
+The pack methods provided by protobuf library will by default use
+'type.googleapis.com/full.type.name' as the type URL and the unpack
+methods only use the fully qualified type name after the last '/'
+in the type URL, for example "foo.bar.com/x/y.z" will yield type
+name "y.z".
+
+JSON
+====
+The JSON representation of an `Any` value uses the regular
+representation of the deserialized, embedded message, with an
+additional field `@type` which contains the type URL. Example:
+
+ package google.profile;
+ message Person {
+ string first_name = 1;
+ string last_name = 2;
+ }
+
+ {
+ "@type": "type.googleapis.com/google.profile.Person",
+ "firstName": ,
+ "lastName":
+ }
+
+If the embedded message type is well-known and has a custom JSON
+representation, that representation will be embedded adding a field
+`value` which holds the custom JSON in addition to the `@type`
+field. Example (for message [google.protobuf.Duration][]):
+
+ {
+ "@type": "type.googleapis.com/google.protobuf.Duration",
+ "value": "1.212s"
+ }
+
+