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The Way to Go

Go Work Environment

Explore how to establish a Go work environment by organizing your workspace with src, bin, and pkg directories, setting GOPATH and PATH variables. Understand Go runtime essentials, environment customization, and cross-compiling to prepare for developing and deploying Go applications efficiently.

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Workspace #

A folder structure with two directories at its root is typically is called a workspace. A typical Golang project keeps all its code in a single workspace. The workspace of Golang is:

  • src, a folder that contains Go source code files
  • bin, a folder that contains executable binaries (also called commands)

However, if you need external packages, there will also be a folder called pkg to accommodate these.

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GOPATH variable

The workspace root location cannot be the same as the Go install location, and it is specified by the GOPATH environment variable. It is by default a go subfolder in the home directory, so $HOME/go on Unix or C:\Users\username\go on Windows. Add the bin folder of your workspace to the PATH variable so that your application binaries are automatically found. For example on Linux add the following to your .profile:

export GOPATH=$HOME/go # this is the default
export PATH=$PATH:$GOPATH/bin
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