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Merged
donald-pinckney merged 8 commits into from
Mar 19, 2026
Merged

Add Go (supersedes other PR) #38

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d789f8c
progress on go
donald-pinckney Mar 16, 2026
45aca64
Go translation workflow completed.
donald-pinckney Mar 16, 2026
ca97341
missed a few spots
donald-pinckney Mar 16, 2026
b78919c
Manual edits
donald-pinckney Mar 17, 2026
80a2641
Address feedback
donald-pinckney Mar 17, 2026
1ac2786
Add gotcha about anonymous local activities
donald-pinckney Mar 18, 2026
ee30251
Sample code for payload converter
donald-pinckney Mar 18, 2026
5426918
clarify sdk protection mechanisms
donald-pinckney Mar 19, 2026
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Go translation workflow completed.
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@donald-pinckney
donald-pinckney committed Mar 16, 2026
commit 45aca64920e99a7dff1c1211535611e7423513d1
2 changes: 1 addition & 1 deletion references/go/data-handling.md
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Expand Up @@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ Structs must have exported fields to be serialized.

## Custom Data Converter

Implement the `converter.DataConverter` interface (`ToPayload`, `FromPayload`, `ToPayloads`, `FromPayloads`, `ToString`) or compose a new converter from existing ones.
Implement the `converter.DataConverter` interface (`ToPayload`, `FromPayload`, `ToPayloads`, `FromPayloads`, `ToString`, `ToStrings`) or compose a new converter from existing ones.

@yuandrew yuandrew Mar 18, 2026

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More of a meta question to skills in general (as someone not super up-to-speed), this line reminds me that some of these docs are basically the same as the code itself, and now introduce a new place we have to keep in sync with the code itself, like if we happen to add a new method to this interface. I think someone could argue it's equally as fast to look at the code itself to see what methods the interface has.

Is this skill basically organizing the codebase in a AI digestible way so it doesn't need to dig through the code itself? Is adding information like this proven to be beneficial to the skill? Would the gain from this be comparable to if we ensured our docs were thorough and up to date?

@donald-pinckney donald-pinckney Mar 18, 2026

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Lots of questions here, I'll do what i can to break it down :).

Q1: What value does a skill provide vs. docs vs. the SDK code itself?

For reference, you can currently use these 2 MCP servers:

  • Kapa: MCP server for docs access.
  • context7: MCP server for SDK API search questions

So the question is, what value does a skill provide compared to those two MCP servers?

Primarily, its about providing a more tightly curated "garden path" to show to the agent, compared to the much broader in scope docs and SDK code. The aim is to make it both more digestable (= faster for the agent to index into the content that matters), and be able to force items into its context.

As an example, consider the data converters. Just by loading the top level SKILL.md, the agent will (no choice) get links to references/go/data-handling.md in its context. If its doing some task where data serialization seems relevant, it would be highly likely to then load references/go/data-handling.md, since it knows it exists. If you are just using Kapa or context7, there is nothing in the agent's context that alerts the agent that Temporal has any concept of data handling / serialization / etc., so it might not decide to do an MCP call to lookup in the docs or SDK code about data conversion.

Q2: How do we know this is beneficial to the agent?

The only way we will know for sure is by doing extensive evaluations. I'm currently working on this, but if you want to help, the most helpful thing you can do is note down Temporal coding tasks that a coding agent performed poorly on. Given difficult tasks, we can then observe that the agent completes them successfully given the skill. Let me know if you know of any tricky tasks for agents!

Q3: How do we keep skill in sync?

This is discussed a bit in the PRD, but essentially I will track what SDK versions the skill was currently written for, and then in the future can diff changelogs, and identify and fix stale areas of the skill. I'd also like to investigate snipsync sorts of stuff for managing code snippets better.

@donald-pinckney donald-pinckney Mar 18, 2026

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That being said, I don't like this Custom Data Converter content thats here. I don't think its descriptive enough to really be helpful to the agent. Will fix.

@donald-pinckney donald-pinckney Mar 18, 2026 •
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Has been changed to a code sample.

@yuandrew yuandrew Mar 18, 2026

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Thanks for the answers! I'll take a closer look at the PRD as well

if you want to help, the most helpful thing you can do is note down Temporal coding tasks that a coding agent performed poorly on.

sounds good, will keep an eye out and remember to give you feedback when I come across this 😃


Pass the custom converter via client options:

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4 changes: 3 additions & 1 deletion references/go/gotchas.md
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Expand Up @@ -97,9 +97,11 @@ r := rand.Intn(100) // Non-deterministic
// GOOD
t := workflow.Now(ctx) // Deterministic
workflow.Sleep(ctx, time.Second) // Durable timer
val, _ := workflow.SideEffect(ctx, func(ctx workflow.Context) interface{} {
encoded := workflow.SideEffect(ctx, func(ctx workflow.Context) interface{} {
return rand.Intn(100)
})
var r int
encoded.Get(&r)
```

Use the `workflowcheck` static analysis tool to catch non-deterministic calls. For false positives, annotate with `//workflowcheck:ignore` on the line above.
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