📦 Put dev dependencies in tools.go

TL;DR: Use a tools.go file with //go:build tools to list import _ "github.com/octocat/somedevtool" to stop go mod tidy from removing them.

//go:build tools

package tools

import (
    _ "github.com/melbahja/got/cmd/got"
    _ "github.com/arkady-emelyanov/go-shellparse"
)

^{💡 go mod tidy doesn't care if the package is cmd or lib}

Then you can use whatever you list in tools.go in //go:generate and task.go!

package mylib

//go:generate -command got go run github.com/melbahja/got/cmd/got

import (
  "fmt"
  _ "embed"
)
//go:generate got https://example.org/image.png -o image.png
//go:embed image.png
var imagePNG []byte

// task.go
//go:build ignore

package main

import "github.com/arkady-emelyanov/go-shellparse"

func main() {
  // ...
}

🏎 Use task.go for your Go project scripts

Other resources

• https://play-with-go.dev/tools-as-dependencies_go119_en/
• https://www.tiredsg.dev/blog/golang-tools-as-dependencies/