github.com/argoproj/argo-cd

ArgoCD is primarily designed as a standalone application rather than an embeddable library. While the codebase exposes Go packages, treating it as a reusable library comes with significant friction. The API surface is tightly coupled to ArgoCD's internal architecture, making it difficult to import specific components without pulling in substantial dependencies.

From an operational perspective, the resource management is reasonable for the main application, but configuration flexibility suffers when trying to customize behavior programmatically. Connection pooling to Git repositories and Kubernetes clusters works adequately in the main deployment, but timeout configurations are scattered across multiple layers. The retry logic for Git operations and cluster connections is present but not easily tunable when embedding components.

Logging uses structured logging (logrus initially, moving to other frameworks in later versions), which provides decent observability hooks, but error handling can be verbose with deeply nested errors that are hard to parse programmatically. Breaking changes between versions are common given the application-first design philosophy, and the library boundaries aren't well-defined for stable consumption as Go packages.

ArgoCD is primarily designed as a standalone application rather than an embeddable library. Using it as a Go package means importing massive dependencies (client-go, git implementations, CRD controllers) which bloat your binary significantly. The API surface is sprawling and not well-documented for programmatic use - most documentation targets kubectl/UI users.

Resource management is a real concern. The reconciliation loops don't expose granular timeout controls, and the git polling mechanism can accumulate connections under load. You'll need to carefully manage the ApplicationController lifecycle and watch for memory leaks in long-running processes. The logging uses klog which works but lacks structured field support that production ops teams expect.

Configuration is heavily tied to ConfigMaps and CRDs rather than code-first approaches. Breaking changes between minor versions have burned us - the package itself isn't following semantic versioning strictly. Error handling often returns generic errors without context, making debugging sync failures difficult without diving into source code.

Using Argo CD as a Go library rather than its primary CLI/UI is a niche use case, and it shows. The package structure is heavily oriented toward internal server implementation, making it difficult to import specific functionality without pulling in massive dependency trees. Documentation for programmatic usage is sparse—most resources focus on deploying Argo CD itself rather than embedding it in custom Go applications.

The API surface is large and complex, reflecting Argo CD's comprehensive feature set for GitOps workflows. However, common tasks like programmatically syncing applications or querying cluster state require deep diving into internal packages that weren't designed for external consumption. Error messages can be cryptic, often referencing Kubernetes internals without clear context about what went wrong in your code. Debugging requires understanding both Argo CD's architecture and Kubernetes controller patterns.

If you're building custom tooling that needs to interact with Argo CD, you'll likely spend significant time reverse-engineering examples from the codebase itself. The GitHub issues are moderately responsive but heavily skewed toward operator/user questions rather than developer library usage. Community support on Stack Overflow is minimal for Go library integration scenarios.