Musings of a software engineer, dad, and geek at heart.

Why should you use Golang when starting new software dev side-projects? (Hint, move faster & spend less)

When starting a new side project, you don't know what the end result will look like.

As a convert to Golang nearly 7 years ago, I've written many small projects with it. Most dead and forgotten, some running for years with virtually no effort. With each new project, I'm convinced Go is the perfect starting point.

Here's why Golang is a great choice for small side projects:

No distractions, Just code

It Just Works™, and can be as simple as a single main.go file if you choose. No picking a dependency manager or build tool (looking at you JS). The language even encourages you to get to work solving your problem, not spend hours finding “the right package” to solve it for you.

Born for the cloud, besties with serverless

Run it cheap, run it serverless. Go is extremely resource efficient, has blazing fast startup times, and produces self-contained artifacts. It is a perfect match for serverless infrastructure where you pay based on resources consumed.

Add in a few great Github Templates* and you have an asset deploying with a CI/CD pipeline to a low-to-no cost serverless infrastructure in minutes.

PoC fast, pivot quickly

With the two prior bullet points in place, Go lets you PoC blazing fast, for virtually zero cost. Doesn't matter if you're shipping a CLI, API, or full website. And since we know where you started isn't where you're going, Go lets you pivot quickly. No ceremony, just code.

Side projects are all about efficiency with your time. Pick tools that get out of the way and let you move fast and cheap.

Next time you're thinking of kicking off a new side project, try building it with Golang.Tweet lead-in

*Bonus: My best templates aren't public (yet), but you can use this (https://github.com/bkono/go-lambdatmpl) as a great starting point for AWS Lambda.

This Day 13 #ship30for30 #atomicEssay was shipped with this twitter thread:

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