5 ms·

Does Go really aim to discourage the programmer from adding runtime checks? What's the reasoning there?

• orisho 6y ago
  An assertion, I think, would crash the program. In that sense implementing them is simple - just panic when the condition is violated. Go prefers plain checks that return errors, though. Panics should be used for truly unexpected conditions, such as a nil pointer. Invalid input, as in this case, would be better served as an error.
  • randomdata 6y ago
    > Panics should be used for truly unexpected conditions, such as a nil pointer. Exceptional cases, if you will. I find it funny when people say Go doesn't have exceptions when Go is the only mainstream language that advocates for and prefers the use of exceptions.
• dmurray 6y ago
  To encourage "proper error handling and reporting" according to the FAQ. https://golang.org/doc/faq#assertions https://golang.org/doc/faq#assertions
• sanxiyn 6y ago
  Yes, Go really does discourage assertions.