Making a Go program faster with a one-character change
As an old C/C++ programmer, I'm always surprised by how often software developers are surprised by the performance costs of inopportune value semantics (C and C++ even more so, punishes you severely for using value semantics when you shouldn't). I increasingly see the wisdom of languages with implicit reference semantics.<p>It's not that value semantics can't be better (they most assuredly can be), or that reference semantics don't cause their own complexity problems, but rather that so often we thoughtlessly imply/impose value semantics through interfaces in ways that negatively impact performance;  getting interfaces wrong is a much tougher bell to unring.<p>The vast majority of my mental energy when I define an interface in C++ is carefully thinking through a combination of ownership contracts and value vs. reference semantics that I can mostly ignore in languages with implicit reference semantics. While occasionally ignoring those contracts while developing in Java/Python/whatever comes back to bite me, the problem isn't nearly as common or problematic as when I unintentionally impose value semantics in a language that allows me to.