Data types

Data types in Go

Declaration and primitives

There are many ways to declare a variable. Most basic three initializations are:

• explicit: declare the type + var or const syntax
• explicit inline
• implicit: using :=, compiler will declare the type for you $\leftarrow$ used most of the time

// explicit
var i int
i = 42

// explicit inline
var f float32 = 3.14

// implicit
someString := "Go is great!"

Some primitives:

someString := "Go"
someString := 'Go' // error: more than one character in rune literal
someBool := true
someComplex := complex(3, 4)
someReal, someIm := real(someComplex), imag(someComplex) // split out complex number into its real & imaginary components

(3 + 4i), complex number: số phức, i^2 = -1
> someComplex: (+3.000000e+000+4.000000e+000i)
> someReal: +3.000000e+000
> someIm: +4.000000e+000

Pointer

Pointer holds the address of a location in memory that holds the variable.

If you are not pointing the pointer to anything when declared, it will get error when assigned.

var myName *string // not pointing to anything -> so it is <nil>

*myName = "huytu" // runtime error: invalid memory address or nil pointer dereference

Therefore, you will need to assign new for pointer when initialized. You can use * operator to reach though the pointer and grab the data back, this is call de-referencing.

var myName *string = new(string) // not :=
*myName = "huytu"   // de-referencing


> myName: 0xc000040250
> *myName: huytu

Address of a variable

myName := "huytu"
ptr := &myName
// change value
myName = "zzzz"


> ptr: 0xc000040250
> *ptr: huytu
after change value
> ptr: 0xc000040250
> *ptr: zzzz

You can see, I use := for implicit declare, = for assign operator.

Constant

Constant is constant, it cannot be assigned after created. Therefore, we use = instead of :=.

const pi = 3.1415
pi = 3 // cannot assign to pi (untyped float constant 3.1415)

Implicit typed

Implicit syntax means compiler will interpret type as appropriate.

// implicit
const c = 3 // not declare type, but it knows it's integer

// explicit
const c int = 3

Constant have to be defined at compile time. If you set up a constant expression and set it equal to the return value of a function, you will get an error.

const c int = 3
res1 := c + 3
res2 := c + 1.2 // error: (untyped float constant) truncated to int


> res1: 6
>

To fix this, you will need to convert first.

const c int = 3
res1 := c + 3
res2 := float32(c) + 1.2


> res1: 6
> res2: 4.2

res1 = float32(c) + 1.2 // warning: cannot use 'float32(c) + 1.2' (type float32) as the type int

Note that Go is a statically typed language, which means types of variables must be known at compile time, and you can't change their type at runtime.

tip

The standard naming convention is to use PascalCase for constants. E.g.: MyConst instead of MY_CONST.

iota

Look at some examples here:

const (
	first = iota
	second
)

const (
	third = iota
	fourth
)


> first: 0
> second: 1
> third: 0
> fourth: 1

And another example:

const (
	first  = 1
	second = "second"
	three  = iota
	four   = iota
)

func main() {
	println(three, four)
	println(first, second)
	println(three, four)
}


> 2 3
> 1 second
> 2 3

Can you guess how iota works?

The iota keyword represents successive integer constants 0, 1, 2, ...:

• Increments after each usage (aka const specification)
• Resets to 0 whenever the word const appears

constant expression

You can use many constant expressions with iota as well.

const (
	first  = iota + 6
	second = 2 << iota
)


> first: 6
> second: 4 (2 << 1)

If you don't need to write iota expression on every line of constants, one on the first const means apply all for the rest.

const (
	first = iota + 6
	second // shortcut for `second: iota + 6`
)

const (
	third = iota
)


> first: 6
> second: 7
> third: 0

const (
	first
	second = iota // error: missing value in the const declaration
	third
)

You can use the blank identifier _ to skip a value in a list of constants.

const (
    first = iota + 1
    _
    third
    fourth
)


> first: 1
> third: 3
> fourth: 4

Another common application for iota is to implement a bitmask, a small set of booleans, often called flags, represented by the bits in a single number. Read more

Custom data types