On 28 June 2015 at 23:23, Josh Bleecher Snyder notifications@github.com
wrote:

I attempted
golang/lint@b550591
and ultimately failed
golang/lint@4946cea
to write a lint check golang/lint#130 that
analyzed time.Duration constants, to ensure that they were defined using
a unit (that is, like 3 * time.Second, not like 3e9).

The crux of the issue was being able to identify, for a constant
expression, where/how its components were defined.

For example, given:

const (
a = iota
b
c = b * 2
d = c * time.Second
e = d - 1
)

I'd like to be able to trace from e all the way back to the other
expressions from which e's value is derived. This might extend across
files and packages. As far as I can tell, there's no reasonable way to get
this information now. But this information must be available during
typechecking.

This is not a high priority, and there are obviously API questions. Just
putting this on the wishlist. :)

I responded on the 'ultimately failed' bug ticket, but I think the general
answer here is: the type checker API provides you with all the building
blocks you need, and it cannot provide more without (a) redundancy and (b)
sacrificing the ability to load packages without source code.

If you're still stuck next week, we can work on it together at GopherCon if
you like.

Thanks, that's very useful. I think I see the way forward.