Okay, so today I wanna chat about something I was messing around with the other day: goff vs. fields in Go. It’s not super complicated, but it tripped me up a bit, so I figured I’d share my experience.
Basically, I was working on a project that involved dealing with some data structures, and I kept getting confused about when to use goff and when to just stick with regular fields. I started by just diving in, trying to get the code to work, which, as usual, led to a bunch of errors and frustration.
First, I tried using goff to define some of my struct fields. I was thinking, “Okay, this looks like it’ll handle the data marshaling and unmarshaling automatically.” But then I ran into issues with the way the data was being formatted. The automatic handling wasn’t quite working the way I expected. I was seeing weird data types, unexpected null values, and generally just a mess.
Then, I decided to ditch goff for those particular fields and just use regular Go fields with appropriate data types. I manually handled the marshaling and unmarshaling using the json tags and a bit of custom logic. And guess what? Things started working a lot smoother. It was more work upfront, but I had way more control over the data conversion process.
Here’s a little example, not the exact code I was using, but similar enough to get the idea:
Let’s say I had a struct like this originally, trying to use goff (hypothetically!):
type MyData struct {
ID * `json:"id"`
Name * `json:"name"`
And then I switched it to something like this:
type MyData struct {
ID int `json:"id"`
Name string `json:"name"`
The difference was huge. With the second approach, I could easily handle things like:
Checking if the ID was a valid integer before using it.
Trimming whitespace from the Name field.
Setting default values if the fields were missing from the JSON.
The key takeaway for me was that goff might be useful in some scenarios, but if you need fine-grained control over your data, sticking with regular Go fields and handling the marshaling/unmarshaling yourself is often the way to go. It’s a bit more effort, but it gives you the flexibility to deal with edge cases and ensure your data is exactly how you want it.
So, that’s my little tale of goff vs. fields. Hope it helps someone avoid a similar headache!
