Go Coding Conventions

Proverbs

Try to follow the proverbs:

Go Proverbs Simple, Poetic, Pithy Don't communicate by sharing memory, share memory by communicating. Concurrency is not parallelism. Channels orchestrate; mutexes serialize. The bigger the interface, the weaker the abstraction. Make the zero value useful. interface{} says nothing. Gofmt's style is no one's favorite, yet gofmt is everyone's favorite. A little copying is better than a little dependency. Syscall must always be guarded with build tags. Cgo must always be guarded with build tags. Cgo is not Go. With the unsafe package there are no guarantees. Clear is better than clever. Reflection is never clear. Errors are values. Don't just check errors, handle them gracefully. Design the architecture, name the components, document the details. Documentation is for users. Don't panic.

Follow these conventions strictly when writing Go code.

Happy Path Coding

Structure code so the successful path flows straight down. Handle errors immediately, then continue with main logic.

// Correct: happy path flows down.
func ProcessUser(id string) (*User, error) {
    user, err := db.GetUser(id)
    if err != nil {
        return nil, fmt.Errorf("get user %s: %w", id, err)
    }

    if err := user.Validate(); err != nil {
        return nil, fmt.Errorf("validate user %s: %w", id, err)
    }

    return user, nil
}

// Wrong: main logic nested inside conditions.
func ProcessUser(id string) (*User, error) {
    user, err := db.GetUser(id)
    if err == nil {
        if err := user.Validate(); err == nil {
            return user, nil
        } else {
            return nil, err
        }
    }
    return nil, err
}

Error Wrapping

Always wrap errors with context using %w. Include the operation and relevant identifiers.

// Correct: wrapped with context.
if err != nil {
    return fmt.Errorf("create order for customer %s: %w", customerID, err)
}

// Wrong: no context.
if err != nil {
    return err
}

Sentinel Errors

Define package-level sentinel errors for expected error conditions. Use errors.Is() to check.

// Define at package level.
var (
    ErrNotFound     = errors.New("not found")
    ErrUnauthorized = errors.New("unauthorized")
    ErrInvalidInput = errors.New("invalid input")
)

// Return sentinel errors.
func GetUser(id string) (*User, error) {
    user := db.Find(id)
    if user == nil {
        return nil, ErrNotFound
    }
    return user, nil
}

// Check with errors.Is().
user, err := GetUser(id)
if errors.Is(err, ErrNotFound) {
    // Handle not found case.
}

Comments

All comments end with a period.

// ProcessOrder handles order creation and validation.
func ProcessOrder(o *Order) error {
    // Validate the order before processing.
    if err := o.Validate(); err != nil {
        return err
    }
    // Continue with order processing.
    return nil
}

Naming Conventions

Never use Go's predeclared identifiers as variable or parameter names. These include built-in functions and constants that can be shadowed but should not be.

// Wrong: shadows built-in identifiers.
func process(new string, len int, make bool) error {
    copy := "data"
    return nil
}

// Correct: use descriptive names instead.
func process(name string, length int, shouldCreate bool) error {
    dataCopy := "data"
    return nil
}

Predeclared identifiers to avoid:

Functions: new, make, len, cap, append, copy, delete, close, panic, recover, print, println, complex, real, imag, clear, min, max
Constants: true, false, iota, nil
Types: error, bool, string, int, int8, int16, int32, int64, uint, uint8, uint16, uint32, uint64, uintptr, float32, float64, complex64, complex128, byte, rune, any, comparable

Line Length

Maximum line length is 120 characters. Break long lines at logical points.

// Correct: break at logical points.
func ProcessOrderWithValidation(
    ctx context.Context,
    order *Order,
    validator OrderValidator,
) (*Result, error) {
    return nil, fmt.Errorf(
        "process order %s for customer %s: %w",
        order.ID,
        order.CustomerID,
        err,
    )
}

Documentation Lookup

Use go doc to look up standard library and package documentation:

go doc fmt.Errorf
go doc errors.Is
go doc context

Einride

If the project is under the Einride organization, always use the Makefiles in the project which are generated by Sage (the .sage folder).

golang-style