Go Naming Conventions

Go Naming Conventions

Full rationale: Effective Go and the Google Go Style Guide. This skill keeps only the items models actually slip on plus a checklist — it does not restate the guides.

Initialisms and Acronyms

Initialisms keep uniform case — all caps when exported, all lower when not. Never title-case them (Url, Id, Http).

Term	Exported	Unexported	Wrong
URL	URL	url	Url
ID	ID	id	Id
HTTP	HTTP	http	Http
XML API	XMLAPI	xmlAPI	XmlApi
gRPC	GRPC	gRPC	Grpc
DDoS	DDoS	ddos	DDOS
DB	DB	db	Db

// ✓ Good
func ServeHTTP(w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request)
type URLValidator struct{}
var userID string

// ✗ Bad
func ServeHttp(...)
type UrlValidator struct{}
var odpsId string

Getters — no Get prefix

// ✓ Good
owner := obj.Owner()
obj.SetOwner(user)

// ✗ Bad
owner := obj.GetOwner()

Use Compute, Fetch, or List instead of Get when the operation is expensive, involves I/O, or returns a collection.

Don't stutter

Drop the package name from exported identifiers — the caller already qualifies with it.

// ✓ Good
ring.New()        // not ring.NewRing()
bytes.Buffer      // not bytes.ByteBuffer
http.Get()        // not http.HTTPGet()
json.Marshal()    // not json.JSONMarshal()

// ✗ Bad
ring.NewRing()
bufio.BufReader

Receivers

• One or two characters reflecting the type name
• Consistent across all methods of the type
• Never use this or self

func (b *Buffer) Read(p []byte) (n int, err error)
func (r Rectangle) Size() Point
func (sh serverHandler) ServeHTTP(w ResponseWriter, req *Request)

Avoid	Use
func (this *ReportWriter)	func (w *ReportWriter)
func (self *Scanner)	func (s *Scanner)
func (tray Tray)	func (t Tray)
func (info *ResearchInfo)	func (ri *ResearchInfo)

Summary Checklist

1. Use MixedCaps — never underscores (except test names)
2. Short names for small scopes, long names for large scopes
3. Don't stutter — pkg.New() not pkg.NewPkg()
4. Don't embed the type — users not userSlice
5. Don't embed context — count not userCount inside UserCount()
6. Getters have no Get prefix — Owner() not GetOwner()
7. Interfaces: -er suffix for single-method, descriptive for multi-method
8. Receivers: 1–2 chars, consistent, never this/self
9. Constants: MixedCaps not ALL_CAPS
10. Errors: ErrFoo for values, FooError for types
11. Initialisms: URL/url, ID/id — never Url/Id