How to avoid copying vendor proto dependencies on buf generate

I am testing grpc-gateway and trying to figure out the best way to import dependencies in my grpc service. I have the following dir structure:

proto/
  api.proto
  api2.proto
third_party/
  googleapis/
    google/
      api/
        http.proto
        annotations.proto
buf.yaml
buf.gen.yaml

buf.yaml config

version: v1beta1
build:
  roots:
    - third_party/googleapis
    - third_party/grpc-gateway
    - proto

Two things

As you noticed I am using buf.build to generate proto files (you can ignore this fact if you know a better way);
I am not copying googleapi under proto files intentionally and would like to keep them separate somewhere. I know google recommends keeping everything under proto folder and just copying dependent files (like google/api/annotations.proto), but I am not a fan of copying dozens of dependencies into my source code if I can avoid that somehow.

My question is, whenever I run buf generate --path=./proto (please notice path is set as a directory), I get googleapis pb.go files copied under proto/googleapis/ folder. I find it very annoying and cannot figure out what is wrong with my setup. If I specify every file directly, everything is fine (e.g. buf generate --path=./proto/api.proto), no third-party content is copied.

Is there a way to ignore third_party folders on buf generate and if not is there a better way to manage grpc dependencies. Copying files into every grpc project directly does make any sense for me.

Solution

Ok, figured that out. Usually, you'll be either reusing protos from your go/src folder (which has it's downsides due to repo updates) or you copy them into proto/dependency-x folder.

I find buf to take a bit better approach here, but you have to follow proto structuring guidelines which in short are: structure proto files under same root, in different packets. So, in order to avoid copying I have to have the following structure:

proto/
  api/ <- add one more level
    api.proto
    api2.proto
third_party/
  googleapis/
    google/
      api/
        http.proto
        annotations.proto
buf.yaml
buf.gen.yaml

and point buffer right into api folder like this: buf generate --path=./proto/api