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The last two paragraphs of the article address exactly that issue - that it's hard to tell whether the direction of Go development is decided solely by the Go c

The last two paragraphs of the article address exactly that issue - that it's hard to tell whether the direction of Go development is decided solely by the Go core team or by Google as a corporation.

kkarakk 7y ago
...was this ever in doubt? i've always thought from day 1 that this is "Go as in made by Google". Even the name branding screams that
divan 7y ago
Go team is actually incredibly open and approachable if you meet them at conferences. Google (as a company) has little influence on the language design design. Its needs has shaped design (obviously), but it's not like there are requirements outside of the Go team. Go is heavily used in Google, so it's a natural dogfooding process, but that's it.
- FroshKiller 7y ago
  "If you meet them at conferences" is a huge if of inaccessibility.
  - divan 7y ago
    Haha, sorry, they're open outside of conferences too :)
jon-wood 7y ago
I don’t really get this distinction. “Google as a corporation” isn’t a thing, it’s a collection of people, some of whom happen to be the Go core team. It’s likely that due to being close to Go developers at Google there’s a bias towards implementing features that would help those people, but I very much doubt the subject of genetics in Go comes up at board meetings.
- dx034 7y ago
  Google the corporation is represented by upper management, the people by developers. The question is if upper management at Google takes any influence on the development process.
- fragmede 7y ago
  Implementing features Google needs sooner, rather than later, is one thing, but at some point, Google-the-profit-driven-corporation's needs will contradict the broader Golang community's needs, at which point the question is who "wins"? What will, on a long enough timeline, come up in board meetings, especially as Google fails to meet Wall Street analyst's expectations, and as the ad-tech space evolves, is how much of Google-the-corporation's money to continue plowing into broader community things, like Golang at all. Hopefully, by the time that happens, the community will be strong enough to persist, and I use Golang professionally, so I have personal investment for that to be true, but the possible eventuality that it'll end up being in the situation Java is currently in, makes me nervous.
brown9-2 7y ago
A useful mental exercise here: if the core team left Google, do you think they’d lose power?
DannyBee 7y ago
Which is nonsense, and is equivalent in this case to "i never bothered to ask so i'm just going to assert some stuff that agrees with my viewpoint". They could have just asked. In fact I can answer this for you, since I was the relevant director (IE Go directly reported to me) It was driven by the core team, and more particularly, the leads and what they want to be trying to do. I have provided precisely 0% of the vision there. Further, the org/etc they belong to has changed (a very small number of times) over the past 10+ years depending on the Go team goals, not depending on Google's goals. (IE when their goals have changed, or the org goals changed, Google has put them in a place that aligns with their goals, not tried to align them to the goals of the org they belong to)
- mcguire 7y ago
  So, why is Google paying them? Is Google getting enough value out, or PR, or...?
  - takeda 7y ago
    People are stepping around trying not to offend anyone, but it is no secret that Go was created for Google to solve their needs, it supposed to be a simple language that even a fresh graduate out of school could pick it up quickly and work with it. It is also very opinionated for example regarding the formatting or (at least initially before vgo was introduced due to outside pressure) to work well only in a mono repo scenarios. Google makes it free to use, so it will be easier to recruit people that already know it. Many companies do that as well, the difference is that still generally no one uses their languages. This one is different, because well it's Google. The Go itself isn't really that great language, but there's a lot of hype behind it. I wonder when it will die out, but I guess it will be a while.
  - user5994461 7y ago
    Google is getting tremendous value from Go, on multiple fronts. For reference, Go was meant as an alternative to Java and C++, to develop distributed systems. Given the direction that Java went, acquisition by Oracle and $10B lawsuit against Google, it is a well worth having an alternative.

The last two paragraphs of the article address exactly that issue - that it's hard to tell whether the direction of Go development is decided solely by the Go core team or by Google as a corporation.

kkarakk 7y ago

...was this ever in doubt? i've always thought from day 1 that this is "Go as in made by Google". Even the name branding screams that

divan 7y ago

Go team is actually incredibly open and approachable if you meet them at conferences. Google (as a company) has little influence on the language design design. Its needs has shaped design (obviously), but it's not like there are requirements outside of the Go team. Go is heavily used in Google, so it's a natural dogfooding process, but that's it.

FroshKiller 7y ago
"If you meet them at conferences" is a huge if of inaccessibility.
- divan 7y ago
  Haha, sorry, they're open outside of conferences too :)

jon-wood 7y ago

I don’t really get this distinction. “Google as a corporation” isn’t a thing, it’s a collection of people, some of whom happen to be the Go core team. It’s likely that due to being close to Go developers at Google there’s a bias towards implementing features that would help those people, but I very much doubt the subject of genetics in Go comes up at board meetings.

dx034 7y ago
Google the corporation is represented by upper management, the people by developers. The question is if upper management at Google takes any influence on the development process.
fragmede 7y ago
Implementing features Google needs sooner, rather than later, is one thing, but at some point, Google-the-profit-driven-corporation's needs will contradict the broader Golang community's needs, at which point the question is who "wins"? What will, on a long enough timeline, come up in board meetings, especially as Google fails to meet Wall Street analyst's expectations, and as the ad-tech space evolves, is how much of Google-the-corporation's money to continue plowing into broader community things, like Golang at all. Hopefully, by the time that happens, the community will be strong enough to persist, and I use Golang professionally, so I have personal investment for that to be true, but the possible eventuality that it'll end up being in the situation Java is currently in, makes me nervous.

brown9-2 7y ago

A useful mental exercise here: if the core team left Google, do you think they’d lose power?

DannyBee 7y ago

Which is nonsense, and is equivalent in this case to "i never bothered to ask so i'm just going to assert some stuff that agrees with my viewpoint". They could have just asked. In fact I can answer this for you, since I was the relevant director (IE Go directly reported to me) It was driven by the core team, and more particularly, the leads and what they want to be trying to do. I have provided precisely 0% of the vision there. Further, the org/etc they belong to has changed (a very small number of times) over the past 10+ years depending on the Go team goals, not depending on Google's goals. (IE when their goals have changed, or the org goals changed, Google has put them in a place that aligns with their goals, not tried to align them to the goals of the org they belong to)

mcguire 7y ago
So, why is Google paying them? Is Google getting enough value out, or PR, or...?
- takeda 7y ago
  People are stepping around trying not to offend anyone, but it is no secret that Go was created for Google to solve their needs, it supposed to be a simple language that even a fresh graduate out of school could pick it up quickly and work with it. It is also very opinionated for example regarding the formatting or (at least initially before vgo was introduced due to outside pressure) to work well only in a mono repo scenarios. Google makes it free to use, so it will be easier to recruit people that already know it. Many companies do that as well, the difference is that still generally no one uses their languages. This one is different, because well it's Google. The Go itself isn't really that great language, but there's a lot of hype behind it. I wonder when it will die out, but I guess it will be a while.
- user5994461 7y ago
  Google is getting tremendous value from Go, on multiple fronts. For reference, Go was meant as an alternative to Java and C++, to develop distributed systems. Given the direction that Java went, acquisition by Oracle and $10B lawsuit against Google, it is a well worth having an alternative.