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Developer Archetype
The Simplicity Evangelist
"Just a main.go and a README. As it should be."
vibe
Ships binaries while everyone else is still configuring webpack.
Go developer. You believe in explicit error handling, flat package structures, and quietly judging anyone who uses an ORM. Refreshingly pragmatic. Occasionally smug about it.
Typical stack
Go
stdlib
Docker
SQLite
Make
no ORM (obviously)
Known examples
Rob Pike
Co-creator of Go — simplicity as a first principle
Mat Ryer
Go patterns that make other Go developers feel inadequate
Ben Johnson
Bolt, Litestream — small surface area, massive impact
Signature traits
- → main.go is the only file until it absolutely isn't
- → Has written a blog post about why interfaces are enough
- → if err != nil appears more than any other pattern in their code
- → Proud that their binary is a single statically-linked file
Strengths
- ✓ Code is readable by anyone, even without Go experience
- ✓ Operationally simple — deploys are just rsync and restart
- ✓ Rarely over-engineers; the solution matches the problem
Watch out for
- ⚑ Can be dismissive of abstractions that have real value
- ⚑ Error handling verbosity can obscure business logic
- ⚑ Sometimes mistakes "simple" for "incomplete"