In this lesson, we have introduced concepts and syntax related to using maps in our Go programs. Let’s take a moment to review what we’ve learned.

Map Creation

Maps can be initialized with or without data.

customers := map[string]int

employees := map[string]int{
  "John":  1001,
  "Ezira": 1002,
  "Emily": 1003,
}

Accessing

We can look up values with a key. We can also get a status value to determine if the key was set in the map.

count,status := inventory["sporks"]

if status {
  fmt.Println("we have %d sporks!", count)
} else {
  fmt.Println("what is a spork?")
}

Adding and Updating

Adding and updating key-values in our map follows the same format:

customers["George"] = 10.50

Deleting

We use the delete function to remove key-value pairs from our map:

delete(inventory, "sporks")

Conclusion

We can use maps for all sorts of things! Examples include:

• Organizing collections such as types of coins, kinds of donuts, etc.
• Mapping different data such as people names to balance due.
• Storing frequently used content for a user.

We now can use maps in our programs! Try this out anywhere where we need to associate related information.