2.2 KiB
title, homepage, tagline
| title | homepage | tagline |
|---|---|---|
| TinyGo | https://tinygo.org | TinyGo: The Power of Go, in Kilobytes. |
To update or switch versions, run webi tinygo@stable (or @v0.30, @beta,
etc).
Cheat Sheet
TinyGo is an alternate, llvm-based compiler for Go with a much smaller and simpler runtime with a minimum size of kilobytes - suitable for micro-controllers, embedded devices, and good old fashioned CLI utilities that don't need a high-performance garbage collector.
GOOS=linux GOARCH=arm64 \
tinygo build -short -no-debug \
-o hello-v1.0.0-linux-arm64
You may also want to install the Go IDE tooling: go-essentials.
Table of Contents
- Files
- Effective TinyGo
- Compatibility
- Gotchas
Files
These are the files / directories that are created and/or modified with this install:
~/.config/envman/PATH.env
~/.local/opt/tinygo/
~/.local/opt/go/
~/go/
Effective TinyGo
Core differences from Go's self-hosted compiler:
- optimizes for stack usage over heap usage
- avoids reflection
- simpler (but slower) garbage collection
- reimplements some of Go's standard library for performance
By following certain patterns, you can avoid forcing heap allocation and get better memory usage and performance.
See:
- TinyGo: Heap Allocation: https://tinygo.org/docs/concepts/compiler-internals/heap-allocation/.
- TinyGo: A New Compiler: https://tinygo.org/docs/concepts/faq/why-a-new-compiler/
Go Compatibility
Your Go, TinyGo, and dependency versions (particularly golang.org/x) will
need to be paired.
See the Go Compatibility Matrix
Gotchas
Standard Library
- avoid packages that rely heavily on reflection, like
encoding/json
Windows:
- not all Windows syscalls are implemented
macOS:
- you may need to install a conflict-free version of
llvmfrom conflict-free brew to get small sizes when cross-compiling
See also:
- TinyGo: Language Support: https://tinygo.org/docs/reference/lang-support/
- TinyGo: Gotchas: https://tinygo.org/docs/guides/tips-n-tricks/
- TinyGo: Differences from Go: https://tinygo.org/docs/concepts/compiler-internals/differences-from-go/