Check for nil and nil interface in Go

Question

Currently I\'m using this helper function to check for nil and nil interfaces

func isNil(a interface{}) bool {
  defer func() { recover() }()
  return a == n         


        

Answer 1

This is the interface definition for this exmaple solution:

package checker

import (
    "errors"

    "github.com/rs/zerolog"
)

var (
    // ErrNilChecker returned if Check invoked on a nil checker
    ErrNilChecker = errors.New("attempted Check with nil Checker")

    // ErrNilLogger returned if the Check function is provide a nil logger
    ErrNilLogger = errors.New("nil logger provided for Check")
)

// Checker defines the interface
type Checker interface {
    Check(logger *zerolog.Logger) error
}

One of our Checker implementations supports aggregation of Checkers. But testing uncovered the same issue as this thread. This solution uses the reflect package if the simple nil check fails, leveraging the reflect.Value type to resolve the question.

// AggregateChecker implements the Checker interface, and
//  supports reporting the results of applying each checker
type AggregateChecker struct {
    checkers []Checker
}

func (ac *AggregateChecker) Add(aChecker Checker) error {
    if aChecker == nil {
        return ErrNilChecker
    }

    // It is possible the interface is a typed nil value
    // E.g. checker := (&MyChecker)(nil)
    t := reflect.TypeOf(aChecker)
    if reflect.ValueOf(aChecker) == reflect.Zero(t) {
        return ErrNilChecker
    }

    ac.checkers = append(ac.checkers, aChecker)
    return nil
}