Reproducibility flags: -trimpath always, -s -w on release only

byob-release.6 release

Problem: -s -w strips the binary's symbol table and DWARF debug info. It's the right default for a release binary (smaller download, slightly faster load) and the wrong default for a dev build — it breaks delve, pprof, and useful stack traces. Applying it uniformly trades debuggability for file size everywhere.

Idea: split the flag sets:

Dev builds (make build, make install, go run): -trimpath only. Path-free binaries, full symbols.
Release builds (make release via goreleaser): -trimpath -ldflags "-s -w". Stripped + path-free.

-trimpath stays on both because it has no debugging downside — it just removes local filesystem paths from the binary, which is good hygiene regardless.

Pair both with CGO_ENABLED=0 (byob-release.8) for pure-Go, static binaries that cross-compile without a C toolchain.

Reproducibility caveat: -trimpath + -s -w + CGO_ENABLED=0 is not byte-reproducible by itself. The Date ldflag alone defeats it, and reproducible Go builds also need SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH handling and a pinned Go toolchain version. This decision doesn't aim for byte-reproducibility; it aims for small, path-free release binaries and fully debuggable dev binaries. Pursue full reproducibility only if downstream distributors require it.

Design

# Makefile — dev build keeps symbols. Not named GOFLAGS (that's a
# reserved Go env var).
GO_BUILD_FLAGS := -trimpath
LDFLAGS := -X $(PKG).Version=$(VERSION) \
           -X $(PKG).Commit=$(COMMIT) \
           -X $(PKG).Date=$(DATE)
build:
	CGO_ENABLED=0 go build $(GO_BUILD_FLAGS) -ldflags "$(LDFLAGS)" -o bin/$(BIN) ./cmd/$(BIN)

# .goreleaser.yml — release strips symbols:
builds:
  - env: [CGO_ENABLED=0]
    flags: [-trimpath]
    ldflags:
      - -s -w
      - -X github.com/acme/mytool/internal/mytoolcmd/build.Version={{.Version}}
      # ...etc

Same -trimpath, different -s -w. Dev binaries are debuggable; release binaries are lean.