https://www.reddit.com/r/golang/comments/62cupa/is_it_idiomatic_to_return_a_badly_structured/
the example given by the OP is faulty. here is a play illustrating the possible misunderstanding of the OP or typos by the OP: https://play.golang.org/p/rt31qb9EiH but even so, the argument given by Axel is that providing zero values with the returned error helps find and debug problems. the argument against this opinion is that its creates inept and backwards thinking Go devs, while also possibly creating performance penalties without any benefit. The argument against such a pattern is that one should not follow this pattern wholeheartedly because one should rely on checking errors, and that this pattern could produce performance penalties. One should check errors and code accordingly( inside and outside your own code). Returning zero values could be a performance hit or boost depending on what is returned. performance. case in point: https://play.golang.org/p/p7WtbMZj3O , https://play.golang.org/p/p7WtbMZj3O these simple benchmarks show some of the penalties for wholeheartedly following such an absurd pattern, however I also believe that there is potential for performance gains when returning nil pointers to the caller, but benchmarking those cases weren't as easy as others. In conclusion, I feel it is absurd to wholeheartedly follow such a pattern. On Friday, March 31, 2017 at 8:19:52 PM UTC-4, Ian Lance Taylor wrote: > > On Fri, Mar 31, 2017 at 3:33 PM, 'Axel Wagner' via golang-nuts > <golan...@googlegroups.com <javascript:>> wrote: > > > > there recently was a thread on /r/golang, about whether or not to > explicitly > > return useless values when an error occurred, or to just not care, as > the > > caller isn't supposed to use a return value on a non-nil value anyway. > > I follow a simple policy: normally, when returning an error, return > zero values for all the other result parameters. if there is a reason > to do anything else (e.g., io.Reader explicitly permits returning n > > 0 with a non-nil error), then I document the behavior. > > I can't say that I fully grasp the argument you are presenting. I do > feel that it does not make sense to return an invalid, non-zero, value > when returning an error. What would be the point of that? > > Ian > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "golang-nuts" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to golang-nuts+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
