gosane

README

Go Sane

Go Sane is a set of linters that forbids some Go features I think should never have been part of/added to Go:

• generics
• iterators / range-over-func
• short-if syntax
• init() functions
• global variables (with a few exceptions)
• global-state functions like http.ListenAndServe(), log.Print() or viper.Set/Get*()

This repository contains three distinct parts:

1. New linters: nogenerics, noiter, noshortif. Usable on their own or with other tools.
2. The gosane command itself: an all-in-one linter combining these new linters and some existing ones.
3. A .golangci.yml template, combining these new linters and some existing ones.

[!NOTE] nogenerics, noiter and noshortif are in the process of being added to golangci-lint list of linters. gosane will not, as it's a multi-linter and uses some existing ones.

Linters

New linters defined in this repository

nogenerics

Forbids use of Go 1.18's generics.
Yes, sometimes they are useful. Often not really, they just clutter and complexify things a lot.
See Go evolves in the wrong direction, by Aliaksandr Valialkin.

noiter

Forbids use of Go 1.23's iterators.
They complexify for not so much gain.
See Go evolves in the wrong direction, by Aliaksandr Valialkin.

noshortif

Forbids short-if syntax.
In Go, you should have only one way to do something.

Existing linters used by gosane and .golangci.yml template

forbidigo with custom patterns

Forbids global-state functions like http.ListenAndServe(), log.Print() or viper.Set/Get*().
They make testing more complex. spf13/viper now regrets providing them: https://github.com/spf13/viper/#should-viper-be-a-global-singleton-or-passed-around and https://github.com/spf13/viper/issues/1855.

gochecknoinits

Forbids init() functions.
They hide behavior and are never the only choice. spf13/cobra made them famous but now regrets it: https://github.com/spf13/cobra/issues/1862 and https://github.com/spf13/cobra/issues/1335.

Note: I actually had to reimplement it for gosane, because gochecknoinits doesn't use the go/analysis standard. But it's exactly the same thing.

gochecknoglobals

Forbids global variables, except for some legitimate cases: the version variables, errors.New(), regex.MustCompile(), etc.

Usage

golangci-lint

Just copy all or part of .golangci.yaml into your own config. This allows you to pick the rules you want, or modify them.

Standalone

nogenerics, noiter, shortif or the all-in-one gosane are binaries that can be used by themselves, or with go vet.

# go install + manual run
go install github.com/alexandregv/gosane/cmd/gosane@latest
gosane ./...

# go install + go vet
go install github.com/alexandregv/gosane/cmd/gosane@latest
go vet -vettool=$(which gosane) ./...

# go run + go vet
go vet -vettool=$(go run -n github.com/alexandregv/gosane/cmd/gosane@latest 2>&1) ./...

# go tool + go vet
go get -tool github.com/alexandregv/gosane/cmd/gosane@latest
go vet -vettool=$(go tool -n github.com/alexandregv/gosane/cmd/gosane) ./...

Replace gosane with any of nogenerics, noiter or noshortif if you want just a specific linter.