If you want to `range` over a non-rangeable thing, the idiomatic way to do this is to use an iterator approach: var e elem for nonrangeable.HasNext() {

If you want to `range` over a non-rangeable thing, the idiomatic way to do this is to use an iterator approach: var e elem for nonrangeable.HasNext() { e = nonrangeable.Next() // do stuff with e } Coincidentally, that's what the built-in io.Copy [0] does. (I'm also very biased, but I think this approach fits better with the fact that Go is targeted towards stream processing) [0] http://golang.org/src/pkg/io/io.go?s=11928:11988#L330 http://golang.org/src/pkg/io/io.go?s=11928:11988#L330