[go-nuts] getchar()

[Anschel]

I'm sure this is totally obvious, but I can't seem to find it anywhere
in the docs. Is there a go equivalent of getchar() in C? Actually come
to think of it it's not at all obvious how to do even normal io...am I
missing something?

Thanks,
--Anschel

[Steven]

Yes, you're missing the package documentation:

http://golang.org/pkg/

Package os has the Files os.Stdin, os.Stdout, and os.Stderr open. Package bufio gives you buffered access. Example usage:

reader := bufio.NewReader(os.Stdin)

input, _ := reader.ReadString('\n')

You might also want to look at package scanner (not go/scanner). It allows slightly more convenient access, if you want to get things like integers. For output, there's package fmt. It should have some familiar functions.

http://golang.org/pkg/os/

http://golang.org/pkg/bufio/

http://golang.org/pkg/scanner/

http://golang.org/pkg/fmt/

[Anschel]

> reader := bufio.NewReader(os.Stdin)
> input, _ := reader.ReadString('\n')

This is fine for reading a line, but how do I read just one character
or byte without waiting for the user to hit Return?
reader.ReadByte() still waits for a newline before returning control
to the program.

I think what I want to do is set the terminal to raw mode, but I don't
really see how to do that.

[peterGo]

Anschel,

One way to get answers to questions is to search the golang-nuts
mailing list to see if the question has already been answered. For
example,

How to obtain raw character input?
http://groups.google.com/group/golang-nuts/browse_thread/thread/89c31f605f302429/d485483dfe8a8ca4

Peter

[⚖ Alexander "Surma" Surma]

You do realize, that even C's getchar() requires the user to hit enter?
There is ncurses' getch(), where you actually wait for a single
keystroke. So you have to options: Look around for ncurses bindings
(github et al. I'm sure somebody bothered) or you manually open
/dev/tty.

Surma