Reading from Standard Input

In this lesson you will learn how to read standard input with bufio.NewReader in Go, so your program can respond to what a user types. This is for anyone searching for "Go standard input how to use".

bufio.NewReader(os.Stdin) reads one line of input from the keyboard or another source. Use it when a command-line tool needs the user to type something.

The sample code prompts with fmt.Print("Enter your name: "), reads up to the newline with reader.ReadString('\n'), and strips the trailing newline with strings.TrimSpace(name).

A common stumbling block for beginners is using the string with the trailing newline still attached. Since the newline remains, removing it with strings.TrimSpace is the standard move.

In real-world development, using input without validating it can lead to unexpected errors, so pairing it with a validation step is safer.