Create a script or Makefile target to help new developers:

init-dev:
    cp .env .env.go.local.example
    @echo "Created .env.go.local.example – copy to .env.go.local and edit"

Or in Go itself:

// cmd/setup/main.go (optional)
if _, err := os.Stat(".env.go.local"); os.IsNotExist(err) 
    sample := []byte("# Copy this to .env.go.local and edit\nDB_PASSWORD=changeme\n")
    os.WriteFile(".env.go.local.example", sample, 0644)
    fmt.Println("Created .env.go.local.example")

To use the variables from .env.go.local in your Go application, you'll need a package to load the environment variables from the file. A popular choice is github.com/joho/godotenv. Here's a basic example of how to integrate it:

go get github.com/joho/godotenv

package main
import (
    "log"
"github.com/joho/godotenv"
)
func main() 
    // Load environment variables from .env.go.local
    err := godotenv.Load(".env.go.local")
    if err != nil 
        log.Fatal("Error loading .env.go.local file")
// Accessing environment variables
    dbHost := getenv("DB_HOST", "default_host")
    log.Println("DB Host:", dbHost)
// Your application code here
func getenv(key, defaultValue string) string 
    val := os.Getenv(key)
    if val == "" 
        return defaultValue
return val

While .env.go.local is ignored by Git, never commit real secrets. Use a secrets manager (e.g., Vault, AWS Secrets Manager, 1Password CLI) in production, and keep local secrets out of version control entirely.