Best Resources to Learn Go, Google’s Programming Language

While the science community has a lot of love for Python, I’ve also become a fan of Go (Golang). It’s described as a mix of Python, C++, and Java for the modern age.

Go was invented by Robert Griesemer, Rob Pike, and Ken Thompson. It’s described as a mix of C, Java, Python, but especially known for making it easy to build fast and efficient software. It’s a compiled language, so it has the runtime efficiency of C++, but it’s easy to read, so it feels more like an interpreted language like Python.

Why does this speed matter?

We are reaching hardware limitations of Moore’s law, which states that number of transistors per silicon chip doubles every year. And as the amount of data we processes increases too, writing performant software becomes more important. Research has also found that for every second it takes for your site to load; your revenue can be reduced by 7%.

It has a small amount of keywords, it’s easy to use, and it has fast compilation. In addition to Google, companies that use Go include Netflix, Twitch, Uber, and Dropbox, and Docker and Kubernetes were built with it. And the market share is only growing!

If I’ve convinced you to give it a try, read on for the top 5 resources I used to learn to program in Go.