4 ms·

For me, the "learning curve" of Go was very small and that's the kicker. You can get up to speed quickly and get a 'feel' for the language quickly. It's been a

by ENTP 10y ago

For me, the "learning curve" of Go was very small and that's the kicker. You can get up to speed quickly and get a 'feel' for the language quickly. It's been a great learning experience and I recommend it thoroughly.

bluejekyll 10y ago
I encourage anyone that hasn't learned Go, to do it as well. In fact, everyone should learn as many languages as they have time for! Each one has interesting decisions they've made that will possibly help you in your everyday language of choice/work. That being said, Go was fun to learn, and taught me that deployment does have to be as painful as it's been in Java for so many years. But I encourage people to also spend some time with Rust, as it has made a very different set of choices. For me the type and generics system are the best I've ever used and I wish I had access to them in Java.
- pjmlp 10y ago
  > For me the type and generics system are the best I've ever used and I wish I had access to them in Java. Then you should spend some time with OCaml and Haskell. :)
  - bluejekyll 10y ago
    I really should. I haven't had the time (caveat from my post above) :)
fauigerzigerk 10y ago
I continue to be surprised by this argument. It seems to only matter if your job is to learn one language per week. I don't need to get up to speed in a weekend. It's the speed that I'm getting up to that matters. Of course there is a limit to this principle, I grant you that. What matters as well is how readable other people's code is, or even my own code after not touching it for a year. And I mean readable for someone as proficient in the language as the original author. This aspect sometimes seems underappreciated by proponents of "powerful/expressive" languages.
- christophilus 10y ago
  I think what you are saying is that the readability of a language is more important than how easy a language is to learn. I heartily agree. Languages that encourage simple, readable code trump pretty much any other language out there, in my opinion. I can't tell you how many times I've looked at my overly abstract Ruby code and just thought, WTF?! I like Go for this reason. It has more noise (err) than I'd like, but when I look at most Go code, I find it relatively easy to follow and modify. There's no other language I've used that achieves this so consistently.
- jjuel 10y ago
  That is the beauty of gofmt in my opinion. You can pretty much guarantee that your code will be almost the same style as someone else's code. Which in turn increases readability down the line for someone who knows the language.
- weberc2 10y ago
  Learning curve is important because it means you can bring a new team member up to speed quickly--you don't need to find Go developers, you can make them. The learning investment will pay dividends very quickly. Also, Go can be mastered in 1-3 months, whereas other languages take years. Being able to quickly (i.e., cheaply) produce experts in the language seems advantageous.

by ENTP 10y ago

bluejekyll 10y ago

I encourage anyone that hasn't learned Go, to do it as well. In fact, everyone should learn as many languages as they have time for! Each one has interesting decisions they've made that will possibly help you in your everyday language of choice/work. That being said, Go was fun to learn, and taught me that deployment does have to be as painful as it's been in Java for so many years. But I encourage people to also spend some time with Rust, as it has made a very different set of choices. For me the type and generics system are the best I've ever used and I wish I had access to them in Java.

pjmlp 10y ago
> For me the type and generics system are the best I've ever used and I wish I had access to them in Java. Then you should spend some time with OCaml and Haskell. :)
- bluejekyll 10y ago
  I really should. I haven't had the time (caveat from my post above) :)

fauigerzigerk 10y ago

I continue to be surprised by this argument. It seems to only matter if your job is to learn one language per week. I don't need to get up to speed in a weekend. It's the speed that I'm getting up to that matters. Of course there is a limit to this principle, I grant you that. What matters as well is how readable other people's code is, or even my own code after not touching it for a year. And I mean readable for someone as proficient in the language as the original author. This aspect sometimes seems underappreciated by proponents of "powerful/expressive" languages.

christophilus 10y ago
I think what you are saying is that the readability of a language is more important than how easy a language is to learn. I heartily agree. Languages that encourage simple, readable code trump pretty much any other language out there, in my opinion. I can't tell you how many times I've looked at my overly abstract Ruby code and just thought, WTF?! I like Go for this reason. It has more noise (err) than I'd like, but when I look at most Go code, I find it relatively easy to follow and modify. There's no other language I've used that achieves this so consistently.
jjuel 10y ago
That is the beauty of gofmt in my opinion. You can pretty much guarantee that your code will be almost the same style as someone else's code. Which in turn increases readability down the line for someone who knows the language.
weberc2 10y ago
Learning curve is important because it means you can bring a new team member up to speed quickly--you don't need to find Go developers, you can make them. The learning investment will pay dividends very quickly. Also, Go can be mastered in 1-3 months, whereas other languages take years. Being able to quickly (i.e., cheaply) produce experts in the language seems advantageous.