The Equivalent of Java toString() in Go

Internal

• Go Code Examples
• The fmt Package

Overview

Java developers are used to declare a public String toString() {...} method in their class to get instances of that class rendered as custom Strings.

Go has a similar facility. It consists in making the type that needs this behavior implement the fmt.Stringer interface, which has only one String() method that renders the "native" string representation for the instances of that type. The print() or fmt.*Print* library code will use the method if found on the instance to be rendered as string.

Note that is important whether we declare a value or a pointer receiver type. Depending on how the receiver type is declared, we will have to pass to the rendering code either a value, or a pointer to the instance of the type to achieve the desired behavior.

Example

type SomeType struct {
	ID string
}

// String makes SomeType implement the fmt.Stringer interface. It is important whether a value or a pointer receiver type is declared.
func (e SomeType) String() string {
	return fmt.Sprintf("SomeType[%s]", e.ID)
}

...

t := SomeType{ID: "001"}
fmt.Println(t)

will render:

SomeType[001]