Why Go is my favorite programming language • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#91

Post by nindalf » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:14 PM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #2

I think regardless of how each one of us sees Go, its adoption among DevOps (Docker, K8s), Apple and Microsoft means that just like with C and JavaScript it will become unavoidable to use it for certain tasks.

I'm not sure that I follow. To me, it sounds like someone saying we need to program in C because we use git whereas we actually interact with git through the interface they've given us, not through its source code. Even if Docker and K8s become ubiquitous, I see no reason programmers taking advantage of these to also program in Go.

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#92

Post by jwdunne » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:17 PM UTC

cyphar wrote: post #68

jwdunne wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing I've been looking at lately is the various strands of engineering (civil, electrical, mechanical). I've been looking for common threads and general principles that apply to software engineering that otherwise haven't been. A part of what inspired that search is what you discuss: a huge amount of rework. Tools that shift like sand dunes. Many principles and best practice based on "this is what worked for us"…

I think that attempts to unify traditional forms of engineering with software engineering are doomed to failure, because they're so different as vocations. For example, the design and construction stages are indistinguishable (any sufficiently detailed design of software is effectively an implementation of the design). Normal engineering is not the same, and is likely one of the reasons that software prototyping ofte…

That's true. I don't think that there are major things in those disciplines that are directly applicable in a timeless fashion.

My main goal is to find out how these disciplines came about. How exactly did they settle upon their body of knowledge such that they can produce reliable results in the way they do. Not so much what those methods are, but rather how they came about. What is the common thread there and how, if at all possible, can we use that accelerate the same maturity in software?

Maybe it's a process that has to run its course? Maybe at 80 years old, if I live that long, I'll look on a very different kind of software development.

With that said, I also have Fred Brooks whispering "no silver bullet" into my ear on the other shoulder.

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#93

Post by eeZah7Ux » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:22 PM UTC

holydude wrote: post #39

emperorcezar wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly our entire industry is based around being short sighted. Quick to learn is only important if you have the lack of patience to spend the time to learn something you'll be using for years.

Our industry is hugely based on illusions and misconceptions. There are only few places on earth where people regularly rebuild the skyscrapers to build taller ones. The IT industry simply forces you to re-learn the same old paradigms in a new package just to gain 0.1% of something we cannot even define as an improvement.

This is what I most dislike about Go: it's a modest improvement. It could have been much better, with a higher-level and less verbose syntax and allow metaprogramming (e.g. like Nim).

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#94

Post by masklinn » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:26 PM UTC

Denzel wrote: post #47

jwilliams wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> go has a short list of reserved words I use go a lot now. However, I must admit I find the use of interface{} "aka empty interface, aka void*" a weird one. It's technically correct, but it's an odd semantic.

interface{} carries runtime type information in its internal double-word (type + pointer) structure, unlike void*.

Distinction without a difference, talk about Object if you prefer, the only difference is that downcasts are runtime-checked, it remains a huge hole into the typesystem.

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#95

Post by kazinator » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:30 PM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #65

majewsky wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is way safer than void * : A void * can be cast to (and then used as) any arbitrary type, leading to all sorts of undefined behavior. On the other hand, the following code will just panic() (i.e. exit cleanly without corrupting memory). var x int = 5 var i interface{} = &x *(i.(*string)) = "boom"

True, now imagine that program was controlling some kind of device and due to the panic it wasn't able to turn the device off.

Same thing could happen due to bailing out of a function with a return, after checking some condition.

  if (bad_thing)
    return ERR_BAD_THING;

  ... code here to turn off controlled device ...

From my understanding from prior HN discussions, panic is paired with recover; it's a kind of typeless non-local jump and unwind mechanism which can be intercepted. If the device must be turned off, then any panics must be intercepted and code must be executed to put the device in that state.

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#96

Post by jerf » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:33 PM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #71

jerf wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"for all the deficiencies Go has, it is somehow highly compatible with the way my brain works." I have been tempted to write a blog post about "Why People Actually Can Write Real Programs In Go." To listen to HN complain about the language you'd think that it must be clearly impossible to ever write a program of any kind without massively copying and pasting everywhere, when in reality I find it's actually quite plea…

Many of us, old timers, surely programmed in languages like Go in the past, and were able to deliver lots of successful projects into production. I for one was a very passionate Oberon user and Niklaus Wirth is well known for its minimalism design goals, Oberon-07 is even more minimalist than Go. Just because I used to program like that almost 20 years ago, doesn't mean I still enjoy using such minimalist languages.

I absolutely agree that there have been a number of similar languages in the past, in various variations. However, the only one I know of that may have a claim to have gotten to Go's size or perhaps even larger (relative to the time) is Delphi. Go is, if not the first, the first in a long time to be something that can be practically commercially used. (I mean, you can use whatever language you want commercially, but there's definitely more barriers to some than others.)

Also, I can't help but point out that I didn't say I enjoy it for all uses either. I don't do my hobby programming in Go, because I don't have the issue of other programmers doing things I disagree with or don't like. Even if I do something stupid in another language, at least it's my stupid thing and so I tend to understand it better than somebody else trying to come in and see it.

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#97

Post by kazinator » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:33 PM UTC

kasey_junk wrote: post #12

If I were to build a list of the reasons I use go, it wouldn't be terribly different than this one. But interestingly, while I program go every day, I sort of hate it as a language. You'll note this list doesn't actually have much to do with the language per se, the only point directly related to that is that go has a short list of reserved words (which is true of most languages). So for future language designers (or…

> language ergonomics, power, etc are less important than having a standard batteries included development stack

To programmers under twenty five. And that explains not only Go, but volumes of computing history.

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#98

Post by kazinator » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:34 PM UTC

krylon wrote: post #21

I have said it before and I will say it again - for all the deficiencies Go has, it is somehow highly compatible with the way my brain works. One point the article does not mention is the documentation. I think Go's documentation is excellent, it does not overwhelm the reader with its volume, but mostly anything one might want to know about the syntax and semantic can be answered by carefully reading through the docu…

> for all the deficiencies Go has, it is somehow highly compatible with the way my brain works

Careful: that could be a deficiency-for-deficiency compatibility there rather than a good thing.

Fix your brain and the compatibility goes away.

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#99

Post by virmundi » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:35 PM UTC

fetchfetch wrote: post #86

cyphar wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But interestingly, while I program go every day, I sort of hate it as a language. I have the exact same feeling. There's a lot wrong with Go, but it makes up for its problems by having very nice tooling (though of course there's problems with that too).

After having coded tens of thousands of lines in Golang for 4 years, there are a list of probably hundreds of grievances I have about the language itself. The problem is that they're generally outweighed by the simplicity, consistency, and clarity of the language. Is the error system terrible? Obviously. Lack of abstract data types? Awful. Is Rust one thousand fold safer and more syntactically powerful by comparison?…

Why learn a new language just to learn a new language for production stuff? I looked at at switching to Go from Java for my flagship product. I couldn't find enough compelling reasons to switch. It didn't offer enough benefits to outweigh the benefits of Java + Spring Boot. As a result, Java it is.

Now for a new product that I might sell as traditional installed software, Go makes some sense here since it simplifies install. My clients wouldn't need to install and maintain the VM.

In the end I wonder why switch to a new stack just because? I understand learning the languages to see if they are better tools. I understand learning for the sake of learning. But why bet a business on a new language just because it's cool?

Re: Why Go is my favorite programming language

#100

Post by a-saleh » Sat, Aug 19, 2017, 3:36 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #48

krylon wrote: post #21

I have said it before and I will say it again - for all the deficiencies Go has, it is somehow highly compatible with the way my brain works. One point the article does not mention is the documentation. I think Go's documentation is excellent, it does not overwhelm the reader with its volume, but mostly anything one might want to know about the syntax and semantic can be answered by carefully reading through the docu…

"for all the deficiencies Go has, it is somehow highly compatible with the way my brain works." I have been tempted to write a blog post about "Why People Actually Can Write Real Programs In Go." To listen to HN complain about the language you'd think that it must be clearly impossible to ever write a program of any kind without massively copying and pasting everywhere, when in reality I find it's actually quite plea…

As somebody who likes it for work, how do you deal with lack of generics?

My team is starting several new projects in go, where in the past we used either java (and I actually liked java typesystem) or nodejs (and I liked that one as well).

I especialy got used to the functional style of using map/reduce/filter everywhere, and I am not sure if I would be able to continue in this style in staticly typed language without generics?

Or is there a different style I should adopt?