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Ask HN: As a Python developer are you interested in learning Go?

2 points by lcsontos ↗ HN
Hey,

May I ask you to help me in my research with some information? I'm trying to find out which groups of software engineers are interested in the Go programming language. I've been using it for a few years now and heard that mainly Python devs were moving towards it. Is this true in your opinion?

I've been thinking about putting a book together about Go which would follow the philosophy of "Learn Code The Hard Way". Readers would be required to actively participate in creating a fully fledged RESTful back-end application by the end of the book. I wouldn't like people to just type pieces of code, but I would rather ask them to work simple problems out with a test case provided. What do you think about this approach?

I'd really appreciate if you gave me some feedback.

If you have a minute to fill a formal survey out, that would help me most to have an accurate picture what you guys need and interested in to learn. Please submit your answer here: http://bit.ly/1sGWBs9

Many thanks!

Cheers, László

2 comments

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rgacote
Been writing Python code for about 10 years (C/Pascal/Assembly-style languages for 20 years prior to that) and was interested in Go for specific advantages: - coroutines - channels - simple one-file delivery - cross platform (I tend to develop on Mac and deploy on Linux or Windows)

After writing Go for about a year now, I'm switching back to Python -- specifically Python 3.5.

My (personal) issues with Go: - No basic support for NULLs in database responses (yes, there are third-party modules). - XML manipulation is a pain. - third-party module management problematic. - poor debugging environment. Switching back to Python and stepping up to Python 3.5 (and pyInstaller for single-file builds) addresses all the above pain points, plus introduces asyncio which is a seriously pleasant way to build asynchronous web/database applications. Rewrote a 1,000 line Go application in about 300 lines of Python using asyncio.

In addition to the specifics, writing in Go simply was not enjoyable. A typical end of the day with Go felt like I'd (usually) gotten the tool to do what I needed. Contrast that to a typical end of the day with Python feeling like I'd been using a tool that always supported me.

I'll continue to watch what Go is doing, but I'm back in Python (and playing with Elixir) for now.

lcsontos
Thanks for your feedback! I've also heard that devs are tend to move back to Python after having a journey in Go.