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I’m leaving my role as the Product Lead for the Go Language at Google. I’m super proud of …
I’ve recently been getting into go. I’ve built a few applications and libraries.
For this post, let’s explore the ‘gofmt’ or ‘go fmt’ tool further.
Go ships with a basic set of tools common to most languages and development environments. Like most things with go, the tools are simple in design, but powerful in function.
- go build – compile the code
- go install – install (and build) a package
- go get – download and install packages including dependencies
- go test – run test suites and benchmarks
- go doc – generate and view documentation
- go fmt – format and refactor your code
- go run – build and run an app
First thing to note, ‘go fmt’ is just an alias for ‘gofmt -l -w’. When following along, please take note as the two accept different parameters.
Using gofmt to format code
We’ve had decades of endless argument and debate about the correct format of software. Each language has it’s own different idioms and changes and many have multiple differing standards. Golang has done away with these endless debates once and for all by shipping a formatter that ensures that all go code follows the exact same format.
Go fmt isn’t without it’s detractors. People complain that go fmt isn’t customizable and that it puts braces where they don’t want them. A standard isn’t customizable, and it’s this thinking that has caused so much controversy in every other language. Go fmt is great. Not only does it know the correct format, but it understands go code. It properly lines up definitions, properly wraps if statements when they grow to long and ensures that your code completely conforms to the standard.
The best part of this is that all my code complies with the format standard perfectly and I’ve never read the go format policy. I just write code and run go fmt on that code and immediately my code conforms.
Preview which changes gofmt will make
The following command will show you all the changes gofmt will make in diff format.
$ gofmt -d path-to-code
Given a file, it operates on that file; given a directory, it operates on all .go files in that directory, recursively.
Format your code
The following command will make changes directly to your source files.
$ gofmt path-to-code
or
$go fmt -l -w -s path-to-code
Here is an example of the kind of changes gofmt would make
func (f *Filesystem) Files() []*File {
- if len(f.files)<1 {f.captureFiles()}
+ if len(f.files) < 1 {
+ f.captureFiles()
+ }
return f.files
}
Given a file, it operates on that file; given a directory, it operates on all .go files in that directory, recursively.
Simplify mode
‘gofmt’ can also simplify code where appropriate with the additional -s flag. I have found that simplify is safe to use and only will modify code when it’s obvious and clear.
Here is an example of the kind of changes simplify would make.
- final = append(final, first[start:len(first)]...)
+ final = append(final, first[start:]...)
Using gofmt to refactor code
gofmt is much more powerful than simply eliminating arguments about code formatting. It can also restructure your code. Unlike using traditional unix tools like awk and grep, gofmt understands go code and can be used to restructure your code easily.
gofmt uses patterns to identify changes to make to your code. Patterns are established in the first half the expression followed by a ‘->’ then used by the second half of the expression.
Use the flag -d instead of -w to check what gofmt will do prior to running it.
Examples
To check files for unnecessary parentheses (example from the docs):
gofmt -r '(a) -> a' -l *.go
diff hugolib/summary.go gofmt/hugolib/summary.go
for i, line := range rstLines {
if strings.HasPrefix(line, "<body>") {
- rstLines = (rstLines[i+1 : len(rstLines)-3])
+ rstLines = rstLines[i+1 : len(rstLines)-3]
}
}
diff parser/parse_frontmatter_test.go gofmt/parser/parse_frontmatter_test.go
- if (err == nil) != test.errIsNil {
+ if err == nil != test.errIsNil {
Rename a field in a struct. Notice how it not only changes the definition, but every place that the value is set or referenced.
gofmt -r 'a.Info -> a.Information' -d ./
diff hugolib/site.go gofmt/hugolib/site.go
func (s *Site) initializeSiteInfo() {
- s.Info = SiteInfo{
+ s.Information = SiteInfo{
- page.Site = s.Info
+ page.Site = s.Information
- s.Info.Indexes = s.Indexes.BuildOrderedIndexList()
+ s.Information.Indexes = s.Indexes.BuildOrderedIndexList()
- s.Info.LastChange = s.Pages[0].Date
+ s.Information.LastChange = s.Pages[0].Date
for _, p := range s.Pages {
- p.Site = s.Info
+ p.Site = s.Information
}
- n.Data["OrderedIndex"] = s.Info.Indexes[plural]
+ n.Data["OrderedIndex"] = s.Information.Indexes[plural]
return &Node{
Data: make(map[string]interface{}),
- Site: s.Info,
+ Site: s.Information,
}
