Should I use Get methods to get values or should I use fields directly?

Question

I'm using protobuf (and protoc) for the first time with Go.

message MyProtoStruct {
  string description = 1;
}

I'm a little bit confused:

1. should I use methods to get values (like MyProtoStruct.GetDescription()) or

2. should I use fields directly (like MyProtoStruct.Description)?

Answer 1

You can use either. Note that for proto2 generated code rather than proto3 (proto2 is the default), fields in protocol buffer messages are always pointers. In that case, the getters return a zero value if the field is nil. That's very convenient, since it's quite difficult to write code that uses fields directly without causing nil pointer dereferences when a field is missing.

In proto3 generated code (which I'd suggest you use, for more than one reason), I'd suggest you use fields directly. In proto2 generated code, I'd suggest using the get methods.