Golang Basics 🚀

Welcome to the Go world! This doc will help you get started with installing Go and understanding the basics of the language's structure.

🔧 Installing Go

🐗 Linux (Debian/Ubuntu)

sudo apt update
sudo apt install golang-go

🧱 Arch-based Linux (like Manjaro, EndeavourOS, etc.)

sudo pacman -S go

🍏 macOS (using Homebrew)

brew install go

🪟 Windows

Download the installer from: https://go.dev/dl
Run the installer and follow the prompts.
Restart your terminal and verify with:

go version

🔁 Environment Setup

Make sure GOPATH and GOROOT are correctly configured.

For most setups, adding this to your .bashrc or .zshrc helps:

export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/go/bin

For Arch-based systems installed via pacman, this is usually set correctly by default.

📁 Hello, World! Example

package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
	fmt.Println("Hello, Go!")
}

🔍 Explaining the Syntax

`package main`

This tells Go that this is an executable program (not a shared library). When a Go program is compiled, it looks for package main and executes the main() function.

`import`

Used to bring in standard or external packages. For example:

import "fmt" // "fmt" provides formatted I/O

You can import multiple packages like this:

import (
	"fmt"
	"math"
)

`func main()`

This is the entry point of the program. Go will automatically look for the main function and execute it.

📌 Other Common Basics

Variables

var x int = 5
y := 10 // short declaration

Constants

const pi = 3.14

Functions

func add(a int, b int) int {
	return a + b
}

If / Else

if x > y {
	fmt.Println("x is bigger")
} else {
	fmt.Println("y is bigger")
}

Switch

switch x {
case 1:
	fmt.Println("One")
case 2:
	fmt.Println("Two")
default:
	fmt.Println("Other")
}

▶️ Running & Compiling Go Code

Run a Go file directly:

go run filename.go

Compile a Go file into a binary:

go build filename.go

This will create an executable binary with the same name as the file (without the .go extension).

✅ Verifying Installation

go version

To check your Go environment:

go env

🧠 Pro Tip

Go files end with .go
File name doesn’t need to match the function name
There’s no semicolon required at the end of lines (unless you're writing multiple statements on one line)

Stay curious, and Go build cool stuff! 😎

bytebook