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Mastering Go Structs: 7 Advanced Techniques for Efficient Code

Kuldeep Singh
Stackademic
Published in
9 min readSep 8, 2024

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Did you know that Go structs can do much more than just group related data? If you’re looking to take your Go programming skills to the next level, understanding advanced struct techniques is crucial.

In this article, we’ll explore seven powerful ways to use structs that will help you write more efficient and maintainable Go code.

Which, I’ve been doing

Structs in Go are composite data types that group together variables under a single name. They’re the backbone of many Go programs, serving as the foundation for creating complex data structures and implementing object-oriented design patterns. But their capabilities extend far beyond simple data grouping.

By mastering advanced struct techniques, you’ll be able to write code that’s not only more efficient but also easier to read and maintain. These techniques are essential for any Go developer looking to create robust, scalable applications.

Let’s dive in and explore these powerful techniques!

1) Embedding for Composition

Embedding is a powerful feature in Go that allows you to include one struct within another, providing a mechanism for composition.

Unlike inheritance in object-oriented languages, embedding in Go is about composition…

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Responses (4)

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Great article. You said
"Note the use of pointer receivers (*Cache) for methods that modify the cache, and value receivers for methods that only read from it. This is a common pattern in Go:" ; but you still use pointer recever for Get method on the…

First thing is a bad design choice. What if we had another inner struct in that address struct, and on another in that inner struct and so on?

func NewUser(username, email string, age int) *User {
return &User{
Username: username,
email: email,
age: age,
}
}

The constructor function should use the setters to ensure data integrity.
For the same reason "exported" properties should be avoided as much as possible to avoid "invalid" data. 👋🏻