Go tools

Go, gopls, delve and golangci-lint: the Go toolchain and the tools around it.

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Go builds zc-workstation itself. Homebrew installs the toolchain and three tools that editors and AI agents lean on: gopls, the language server; delve, the debugger; and golangci-lint, the linter that also enforces which package may import which.

On the workstation

Installed by the go, gopls, delve and golangci-lint formulae.
Code generators a project needs, such as sqlc or oapi-codegen, are pinned with a tool directive in that project’s go.mod and run through go tool, never installed globally.
A project drives everything through make: make lint, make test, make build. The targets wire up the flags that raw commands miss.
VS Code and Claude Code find gopls on PATH, so both get the same definitions, references and diagnostics.

Keys and commands

Key or command Does

Key or command	Does
`go test ./internal/plan -run TestName`	Run one test
`go test -race ./…`	Run every test with the race detector
`go tool <name>`	Run a tool pinned in `go.mod`
`go get -tool example.com/cmd@v1.2.3`	Pin a tool in `go.mod`
`golangci-lint run`	Lint with the project’s `.golangci.yml`
`dlv test ./internal/plan`	Debug the tests of one package
`dlv debug ./cmd/app — plan`	Debug a program with its arguments
`gopls check file.go`	Print a file’s diagnostics, as an editor sees them

go test ./internal/plan -run TestName

Run one test

go test -race ./…

Run every test with the race detector

go tool <name>

Run a tool pinned in go.mod

go get -tool example.com/cmd@v1.2.3

Pin a tool in go.mod

golangci-lint run

Lint with the project’s .golangci.yml

dlv test ./internal/plan

Debug the tests of one package

dlv debug ./cmd/app — plan

Debug a program with its arguments

gopls check file.go

Print a file’s diagnostics, as an editor sees them

With zc-workstation

The repository’s .golangci.yml turns on depguard with rules such as plan-performs-no-io: the plan package may not import net/http or run a command. make lint fails when one of these import boundaries is crossed, before review sees it.

$ make lint
go vet ./...
0 issues.

Go tools

On the workstation

Keys and commands

With zc-workstation

See also

Keyboard shortcuts