Machine Setup

OSX Setup

The Terminal

In OSX you can bring up the terminal by hitting CMD-Space (to bring up spotlight), typing Terminal and hitting enter.

Terminals are a text-driven interface to your computer. You can enter commands by typing the command and hitting enter. Your computer will then execute the command and display any results.

Terminals also allow you to manipulate files and folders on your computer. You terminal starts in a working directory where you can list the folder contents with ls, change directories using cd, make directories using mkdir and remove files using rm.

Homebrew

Homebrew is a package manager for OSX. To install it open a terminal (CMD+space, type terminal and then enter) and then paste the following command:

ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"

Git

Git is a version control system used by most 3rd party Go packages. You can install it with Homebrew by running:

brew install git

Atom

GitHub's Atom is an excellent general purpose text editor which also has a very good Go plugin. Download it from atom.io/download/mac and install it by dragging it to your Applications folder in Finder.

For better go support we also need to install the and go-plus plugin. Go to Atom -> Preferences... -> Install, search for go-plus and click Install. When that is finished exit Atom.

Go

The Go toolchain is required to build Go programs. You can download an installer from golang.org/dl. Choose the latest version available for OSX (eg go1.4.2.darwin-amd64-osx10.8.pkg) and run it.

App Engine

Google's App Engine is a managed platform for web applications. If you aren't interested in installing App Engine you can skip this step.

Download the Google App Engine SDK for Go from: cloud.google.com/appengine/downloads.

Open Terminal and unzip the downloaded zip file to your home directory:

cd ~
unzip ~/Downloads/go_appengine_sdk*.zip

This should create a go_appengine folder in your home directory. The App Engine SDK is self-contained and requires no installation. If you want to remove it just delete the folder.

Environment Variables

Environment variables are key-value pairs that any program you execute has access to. They are used as form of configuration that makes programs more flexible.

We need to configure two environment variables: PATH and GOPATH. PATH is used by the operating system to locate executables. It's what makes it possible to execute go version instead of /usr/local/go/bin/go version. GOPATH is used by the Go compiler to find go source code.

Open a terminal and run the following:

env GOPATH=$HOME go get github.com/badgerodon/penv/...

This installs an executable named penv which we can use to set environment variables. To update PATH run this:

$HOME/bin/penv append PATH $HOME/bin
$HOME/bin/penv append PATH $HOME/go_appengine

To update the GOPATH run this:

$HOME/bin/penv set GOPATH $HOME

Finally make sure to quit the Terminal. (So it will pick up the changes)

Finished

You should now have everything you need to create applications with Go and Google App Engine. To verify that your Go installation works open a terminal and run the following:

go get github.com/k0kubun/tetris ; tetris

And you can play tetris. Type q to exit.

Windows Setup

Git

Git is a version control system. We need it for two reasons: (1) many components of Go are distributed via Git and (2) the Windows installer includes a terminal that makes it behave more like Unix operating systems (like OSX or Linux).

Download and install msysgit from msysgit.github.io. When the installer asks make sure to select "Use Git from the Windows Command Prompt".

The Terminal

Windows comes with a terminal called cmd.exe. You can start it by click Start and typing cmd and then selecting it:

Go ahead and close it as we will be using a different terminal that comes bundled with msysgit. Click Start -> All Programs -> Git -> Git Bash.

Terminals are a text-driven interface to your computer. You can enter commands by typing the command and hitting enter. Your computer will then execute the command and display any results.

Terminals also allow you to manipulate files and folders on your computer. You terminal starts in a working directory where you can list the folder contents with ls, change directories using cd, make directories using mkdir and remove files using rm.

Atom

GitHub's Atom is powerful text editor which we will use it to create Go source code files. Download and install it from atom.io.

We also need to install a more robust Go plugin. In Atom go to File -> Settings. Then select Install, and type go-plus into the search box. Install the plugin named go-plus:

Once that is complete, go ahead and close Atom.

Go

Go is a compiled programming language so we need to install the Go toolset. Download and run the installer from here: golang.org/dl. Choose windows-amd64.msi for 64 bit or windows-386.msi for 32 bit. (you probably want the 64 bit version)

Confirm that it worked by opening a new terminal and typing:

go version

You should see the go version you installed.

App Engine

Google's App Engine is a managed platform for web applications. If you aren't interested in installing App Engine you can skip this step.

Install the Google Cloud Tools from: https://cloud.google.com/sdk/docs/#windows.

After installation, open a bash terminal and install the app engine component:

gcloud components install app-engine-go

Python

Python is required for App Engine. If you skipped App Engine you can also skip this step.

Download python 2.7 from python.org/downloads and install it.

Important: Make sure to install Python 2.X and not Python 3.X.

Environment Variables

Environment variables are key-value pairs that any program you execute has access to. They are used as form of configuration that makes programs more flexible.

We need to configure two environment variables: PATH is used by the operating system to locate executables. It's what makes it possible to execute go version instead of /c/Go/bin/go version. GOPATH is used by the Go compiler to find go source code.

Open a bash terminal and run the following:

GOPATH=$HOME go get github.com/badgerodon/penv/...

This installs an executable named penv.exe we can use to set environment variables. To update the PATH run this:

$HOME/bin/penv append PATH $HOME/bin
$HOME/bin/penv append PATH $HOME/go_appengine

To update the GOPATH run this:

$HOME/bin/penv set GOPATH $HOME

Close the terminal.

Finished

You should now have everything you need to create Go programs. To confirm this run the following in a new bash terminal:

go get github.com/k0kubun/tetris ; tetris

A tetris game should start. Type q to exit.

Other Operating System Setup

Nitrous.io

For chromebooks or other operating systems we can use Nitrous.io as a cloud-based programming environment.

Go to lite.nitrous.io and create a new account. Login and create a new box. Choose Go as the template and US West as the region (or whatever you prefer).

Wait a bit and your new machine should bootup. The Nitrous IDE comes with many of the tools we would normally need to configure preinstalled. This includes a basic text editor, the terminal (Console) and Git.

Go

Nitrous.io has the Go toolchain pre-installed, but it's an out of date version. Run the following to update it:

parts update ; parts install go

App Engine

Google's App Engine is a managed platform for web applications. If you aren't interested in installing App Engine you can skip this step.

Download the Google App Engine SDK for Go from cloud.google.com/appengine/downloads using this command: (enter this in the Console at the bottom of the screen)

cd ~
curl -O https://storage.googleapis.com/appengine-sdks/featured/go_appengine_sdk_linux_amd64-1.9.21.zip

curl is a command line application which can make http requests like your web browser does. In this case we use it to download the zip file.

Once that completes, unzip the SDK by running this:

cd ~
unzip ~/go_appengine_sdk*.zip

This should create a go_appengine folder in your home directory. The App Engine SDK is self-contained and requires no installation. If you want to remove it just delete the folder.

Environment Variables

Environment variables are key-value pairs that any program you execute has access to. They are used as form of configuration that makes programs more flexible.

We need to configure two environment variables: PATH and GOPATH. PATH is used by the operating system to locate executables. It's what makes it possible to execute go version instead of /usr/local/go/bin/go version. GOPATH is used by the Go compiler to find go source code.

Open a terminal and run the following:

env GOPATH=$HOME go get github.com/badgerodon/penv/...

This installs an executable named penv which we can use to set environment variables. To update PATH run this:

$HOME/bin/penv append PATH $HOME/bin
$HOME/bin/penv append PATH $HOME/go_appengine

To update the GOPATH run this:

$HOME/bin/penv set GOPATH $HOME

Finally make sure to close the Console. (So when re-opened it will pick up the changes)

Finished

You should now have everything you need to create applications with Go and Google App Engine. To verify that your Go installation works open a terminal and run the following:

go get github.com/k0kubun/tetris ; tetris

And you can play tetris. Type q to exit.