如何在goroutine闭包内更改外部变量的值

Question

func (this *l) PostUpload(ctx *Context) {

    //ctx.Response.Status = 500

    l, err := models.NewL(this.Config)
    go func() {
        err = l.Save(file) 
        if err != nil {
            ctx.Response.Status = 500
            ctx.Response.Body = err
        } else {
            ctx.Response.Status = 204
        }
    }()
}

How to change ctx.Response.Status value inside the goroutine closure?

Answer 1

You have no guarantee to observe changes made to the value of a variable in another goroutine without synchronization. See The Go Memory Model for details.

So if you want to change ctx.Response.Status in another goroutine, for this change to be guaranteed to be visible in the caller goroutine use synchronization.

There are multiple synchronization primitives. You can use channels or the sync package.

Using channels:

ch := make(chan int)

go func() {
    err = l.Save(file) 
    if err != nil {
        ctx.Response.Status = 500
        ctx.Response.Body = err
    } else {
        ctx.Response.Status = 204
    }
    ch <- 0 // Signal that ctx is updated
    // goroutine may do other works (not related to changing ctx)
}()

<- ch // Wait for the goroutine to finish updating ctx

Using sync.WaitGroup:

var wg sync.WaitGroup
wg.Add(1)

go func() {
    err = l.Save(file) 
    if err != nil {
        ctx.Response.Status = 500
        ctx.Response.Body = err
    } else {
        ctx.Response.Status = 204
    }
    wg.Done() // Signal that ctx is updated
    // goroutine may do other works (not related to changing ctx)
}()

wg.Wait() // Wait for the goroutine to finish updating ctx

Using sync.Mutex:

m := sync.Mutex{}
m.Lock()

go func() {
    err = l.Save(file) 
    if err != nil {
        ctx.Response.Status = 500
        ctx.Response.Body = err
    } else {
        ctx.Response.Status = 204
    }
    m.Unlock() // Signal that ctx is updated
    // goroutine may do other works (not related to changing ctx)
}()

m.Lock() // Wait for the goroutine to finish updating ctx

Note:

It is good practice to signal the completion (ctx update in your case) using defer so that if the started goroutine would end in some unexpected way (e.g. runtime panic), the caller goroutine would not get blocked forever. Note that however in this case the completion signal will only be sent at the end of the anonymous function (that's when deferred functions are executed).