Learning Go, 2nd Edition

Preface

In the preface of the first edition, I wrote:

My first choice for a book title was Boring Go because, properly written, Go is boring…​.

Boring does not mean trivial. Using Go correctly requires an understanding of how its features are intended to fit together. While you can write Go code that looks like Java or Python, you’re going to be unhappy with the result and wonder what all the fuss is about. That’s where this book comes in. It walks through the features of Go, explaining how to best use them to write idiomatic code that can grow.

Go remains a small language with a small feature set. It still lacks inheritance, aspect-oriented programming, function overloading, operator overloading, pattern matching, named parameters, exceptions, and many additional features that complicate other languages. So why does a book on a boring language need an update?

There are a few reasons for this edition. First, just as boring doesn’t mean trivial, it also does not mean unchanging. Over the past three years, new features, tools, and libraries have arrived. Improvements like structured logging, fuzzing, workspaces, and vulnerability checking help Go developers create reliable, lasting, maintainable code. Now that Go developers have several years of experience with generics, the standard library has started to include type constraints and generic functions to reduce repetitive code. Even the unsafe package has been updated to make it a little safer. Go developers need a resource that ...