zig-best-practices

Types define the contract before implementation. Follow this workflow: Use Zig's type system to prevent invalid states at compile time. Tagged unions for mutually exclusive states: Explicit error sets for failure modes: Distinct types for domain concepts: Comptime validation for invariants: Non-exhaustive enums for extensibility: Larger cohesive files are idiomatic in Zig. Keep related code together: tests alongside implementation, comptime generics at file scope, public/private controlled by pub . Split only when a file handles genuinely separate concerns. The standard library demonstrates this pattern with files like std/mem.zig containing 2000+ lines of cohesive memory operations. Explicit failure for unimplemented logic: Propagate errors with try: Resource cleanup with errdefer: Exhaustive switch with explicit default: Testing with memory leak detection: Allocator as explicit parameter: Arena allocator for batch operations: Scoped logger for a module: Multiple scopes in a codebase: Generic function with comptime type: Compile-time validation: Prefer explicit comptime type (good): Avoid anytype when type is known (bad): Acceptable anytype for callbacks: Using @TypeOf when anytype is necessary: Specific error set: Error handling with catch block: Typed config struct: Safe optional handling: Optional with if unwrapping: Reference these guides for specialized patterns: CLI...