What is the difference between Go's select statements and polling for synchronizing and communicating among multiple channels in Go programs?

In Go, select statements are used for synchronizing and communicating among multiple channels, whereas polling is a technique of repeatedly checking the status of a resource until it becomes available.

With select statements, a Go program can wait on multiple channels simultaneously, and when a value is available on any of the channels, the corresponding case statement is executed. This makes it easy to write code that reacts to multiple channels in a non-blocking way.

On the other hand, polling requires the program to repeatedly check the status of a resource until it becomes available. This can be done using a loop that checks the status of the resource, and if it's not available, the loop waits for a short period of time before checking again. Polling can be useful in some situations, but it can be less efficient than select statements because it wastes CPU cycles while waiting for a resource to become available.

In summary, select statements are a more efficient and elegant way to synchronize and communicate among multiple channels in Go programs, while polling is a less efficient technique that can be used in some situations where other options are not available.