Out of all programming languages, JavaScript is widely used. However, Python has been gaining popularity lately. Contrary to what’s assumed, Go is still in the top 10 most-loved languages according to the survey conducted by Stack Overflow. Some famous companies that use Go include Google, Kubernetes, Uber, Docker, PayPal, and Dropbox.
But who created it? Well, it was developed by three developers: Robert Griesemer, Rob Pike, and Ken Thompson. In 2007, they released it, but it was in 2009 that they launched it as an open-source programming language.
The main reason behind its creation was to address issues related to networked layers, scalability, performance, productivity, and concurrency. They were done with the complexity of C++. They wanted something that could address all the issues. That’s also why it was released to speed up the coding process and support multicore computing.
Moreover, Go is inspired by various programming languages. For instance, concurrency was inspired by Limbo and Newsqueak. Similarly, it has taken readability and usability from Python. But all these features aim at just one thing — stability in Go.
A little more information about Go:
It is a statically typed and compiled high-level language.
It is somewhat similar to C, but contrary to it, it has memory safety, garbage collection, structural typing, and CSP-style concurrency.
It was created because developers were frustrated with existing languages.
Go and Golang mean the same thing. Previously, the domain go.org wasn’t available, so it was launched as golang.org (a mix of Go and language).
It is a general-purpose language specifically for creating backends.
Moreover, since Go is an open-source project, it also provides access to various development tools. The IDEs that work well with it include GoLand, LiteIDE, and Zeus IDE. For editors, you can use VSCode.
So, you see it isn’t challenging to understand why Go is popular these days. But that’s not the only advantage of using Go. The fact that Go is really simple and has a small learning curve makes it one of the best languages to master. But, out of all, Go is best for backend engineers. Developers can address requests on the server side without using a lot of memory.