What is go-lang-idea-plugin?

go-lang-plugin-org/go-lang-idea-plugin — explained in plain English

Analysis updated 2026-06-26

★ 4,537JavaAudience · developerComplexity · 4/5LicenseSetup · hard

Mindmap

mindmap
  root((go-lang-idea-plugin))
    What it was
      Go language support
      Syntax highlighting
      Code navigation
    Current Status
      Officially deprecated
      No maintenance
      Historical archive
    Replacement
      JetBrains GoLand
      Official Go plugin
      IntelliJ Ultimate
    Tech
      Java
      IntelliJ Platform

mindmap root((go-lang-idea-plugin)) What it was Go language support Syntax highlighting Code navigation Current Status Officially deprecated No maintenance Historical archive Replacement JetBrains GoLand Official Go plugin IntelliJ Ultimate Tech Java IntelliJ Platform

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What do people build with it?

USE CASE 1

Study this historical source code to understand how IntelliJ platform language plugins are structured in Java

USE CASE 2

Reference the plugin architecture as a starting point for building a new JetBrains IDE language plugin

What is it built with?

JavaIntelliJ Platform

How does it compare?

	go-lang-plugin-org/go-lang-idea-plugin	danielzeller/depth-lib-android-	phishman3579/java-algorithms-implementation
Stars	4,537	4,533	4,532
Language	Java	Java	Java
Setup difficulty	hard	moderate	easy
Complexity	4/5	2/5	2/5
Audience	developer	developer	developer

Figures from each repo's GitHub metadata at analysis time.

How do you get it running?

Difficulty · hard Time to first run · 1day+

Project is deprecated, new users should install GoLand or the official JetBrains Go plugin instead of building this from source.

Use freely for any purpose including commercial use as long as you include the Apache 2.0 copyright and license text.

So what is it?

This repository holds the source code for a community-built plugin that added Go programming language support to JetBrains IDEs such as IntelliJ IDEA, WebStorm, PyCharm, and Android Studio. It is now officially deprecated and no longer maintained. The plugin was created before JetBrains released their own official Go support. It brought basic Go editing capabilities, including syntax highlighting and some code navigation, to the IntelliJ platform for developers who wanted to write Go code in an IDE they were already familiar with. The README makes clear that this plugin has been superseded. JetBrains now distributes a dedicated Go IDE called GoLand and also maintains an official Go plugin for IntelliJ IDEA Ultimate. These official products include capabilities that this community plugin never implemented, including type-aware code completion, refactoring tools, a significantly faster debugger, support for subtests, and compatibility with Go versions from 1.9 onward. Users are directed to those official channels for bug reports and new feature requests. At its peak, the plugin supported installation on IntelliJ-based IDEs from version 2016.1 onward. It offered nightly and alpha pre-release builds for users who wanted the latest changes. The versioning scheme tied plugin version numbers to specific IntelliJ Platform versions, so users needed to match the two. The plugin is written in Java, which is the standard language for building IntelliJ platform extensions, and is distributed under the Apache License 2.0. Anyone still encountering this repository while looking for Go IDE support should use GoLand or the official JetBrains-maintained plugin instead.

Copy-paste prompts

Prompt 1

I'm migrating from the deprecated go-lang-idea-plugin to JetBrains GoLand. What features does GoLand have that the community plugin never implemented, like type-aware completion or debugger support?

Prompt 2

How do I build an IntelliJ platform plugin from source using Gradle? Walk me through the setup similar to how go-lang-idea-plugin was structured.

Prompt 3

I want to write my own JetBrains plugin for a new programming language. What can I learn from the go-lang-idea-plugin's Java source code about registering language features in plugin.xml?

Frequently asked questions