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Why Clojure?

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Re: Why Clojure?

#81

Post by newlisp »

jwr wrote: post #62
newlisp wrote: post #37

Using Clojure without Datomic can be frustrating since you feel like you lose some of the language's value, as you likely want to extend its philosophy and style to the database as well. Of course, Hickey probably knew this when he started planning Clojure, which is why he also created Datomic. However, Datomic can be a hard pill to swallow

Hard disagree: I never used Datomic and likely never will, and I don't feel like I'm "losing some of the language's value". Datomic is a database. You can use any database you like.

Datomic feels like a natural extension of Clojure for storing data—you get no impedance mismatch, you continue working with Clojure's data structures for storing, querying, and writing data instead of dealing with clunky query builders(or SQL strings), and you gain immutability. Sure, you can use any database you like, but then you're playing the same game as every other programming language, ultimately getting less value out of Clojure and making it feel like just another language—at least for applications that require a database.

Re: Why Clojure?

#82

Post by int_19h »

zelphirkalt wrote: post #12
ilrwbwrkhv wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know people talk about python being Lisp without brackets, but for example in SBCL and in other lisps like clojure I could just run a larger function, figure out that there is the wrong output, change a tiny function in it, eval that, eval the larger output, get the result. In SBCL there is also the break loop which is just magical. I do not know how you do that in python without using a debugger and stepping throu…

I think in Python REPL you just have to redefine the whole larger function. I am not aware of a way to access internally bound identifiers, or even modify what values they are bound to.

For starters, those identifiers aren't bound until the function actually runs.

Re: Why Clojure?

#83

Post by newlisp »

tombert wrote: post #73
mattmein wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that particular issue was addressed in the recent Clojure release [ https://clojure.org/news/2024/09/05/clojure-1-12-0 ] ("Clojure developers can now invoke Java methods taking functional interfaces by passing functions with matching arity.")

Looks like you're right! I stand corrected, it's admittedly been a few months since I've touched Clojure.

You were not wrong though, Java 8 was released in 2014, so it only took them ~10 years ;)

Re: Why Clojure?

#84

Post by ilrwbwrkhv »

codr7 wrote: post #15
ilrwbwrkhv wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know people talk about python being Lisp without brackets, but for example in SBCL and in other lisps like clojure I could just run a larger function, figure out that there is the wrong output, change a tiny function in it, eval that, eval the larger output, get the result. In SBCL there is also the break loop which is just magical. I do not know how you do that in python without using a debugger and stepping throu…

The condition framework/break loop is one thing I wish more Lisps would copy.

Thats the one thing I miss in Clojure from CL. Although technically due to Clojure' immutability you have to do the same number of changes. But just dropping into the break loop, updating, continuing is just magic.

Re: Why Clojure?

#85

Post by iLemming »

I love writing Clojure. Whenever I say that publicly, there are inevitably some voices challenging my stance with skepticism, criticism, and attempts to discredit whatever I say provides practical value for me. Then I have to explain to them, "no, it's not the only language I know," "yes, I've used dozens of other languages before," "yes, including languages with robust static type systems as well."

And you know what? Finally, I realized - I don't have to explain to anyone in exact detail why I have not found the same deep love in C, C#, Python, Javascript, Typescript, Ruby, Go, Java, Kotlin, Swift, Lua, Haskell, and many others. Why do I need anyone's permission to love a tool? I love it, and I love it for many reasons - theoretical, practical, emotional, fiscal.

Sure, I can get behind your excitement for Rust, Kotlin, OCaml, Elixir, Julia - you name it, but please, please do not try to "educate" me about my choices. I don't care about YOUR personal predicaments with Clojure/Clojurescript/Babashka/nbb, even Fennel. You find Clojure not to be worthy of your time - it's YOUR loss. My love for Clojure is not due to MY skill issues, not the result of MY inexperience, not because "I'm in a bubble," or "I don't know any better," or have zero knowledge of type systems, category theory, OOP or design patterns.

Sure, Clojure is not without deficiencies - no tool is ever perfect. Yet pragmatically, no other programming language in the category of general-use PLs today satisfies me more than Clojure, no other language is nearly as joyful to use. I'm sure at some point my stance will change, I will find some other "perfect" language for me, and 100% guaranteed - it will too have some deficiencies and people will be arguing for the merits of choosing it for the job. Until that day, let me just say it again - "I fucking love Clojure!"

Re: Why Clojure?

#86

Post by hlship »

saghm wrote: post #49
phtrivier wrote: post #36

The part about the "stability" is a bit surprising - in my experience, I try playing with clojure about once a year, and every time, everything is different (I mean, I had to go through classpathes, then lein, then boot, then deps.edn - what is the current way to "try and run a program" du jour ?) Also, is running your "hello world" still going to be incredibly slow, or has something changed in the core system (I kno…

I've always heard that the JVM[0] in general is considered to have a fairly high startup time compared to other common compiled language targets; is Clojure especially bad in this regard, or is this something that's frustrating coming from outside the JVM ecosystem that just adds additional friction when you're already trying to look into using new language? [0] Not sure what the correct term is here, but I mean the…

~ > time bb -e '(println "Hello World")' Hello World bb -e '(println "Hello World")' 0.01s user 0.03s system 18% cpu 0.212 total

bb is Babashka: a pre-compiled (using Graal), interpreted, scripting language version of Clojure.

In terms of realistic work:

~/workspaces/github/pedestal/tests > time clj -X:test {:in user/eval2321, :line 13, :thread "main", :dev-mode? false}

Running tests in #{"test"}

...

Testing io.pedestal.test-test

Ran 391 tests containing 1180 assertions. 0 failures, 0 errors. clj -X:test 30.15s user 2.04s system 203% cpu 15.838 total ~/workspaces/github/pedestal/tests > java -version openjdk version "23.0.2" 2025-01-21 OpenJDK Runtime Environment Corretto-23.0.2.7.1 (build 23.0.2+7-FR) OpenJDK 64-Bit Server VM Corretto-23.0.2.7.1 (build 23.0.2+7-FR, mixed mode, sharing)

That's on my Intel MacBook Pro. Pedestal's test suite loads a good amount of Java classes and Clojure namespaces.

To make things faster, there's ahead-of-time compilation (which basically captures the read-eval-create-bytecode part of loading a Clojure namespace as Java .class files that can be packaged into your app).

Re: Why Clojure?

#87

Post by hlship »

jayceedenton wrote: post #55
phtrivier wrote: post #36

The part about the "stability" is a bit surprising - in my experience, I try playing with clojure about once a year, and every time, everything is different (I mean, I had to go through classpathes, then lein, then boot, then deps.edn - what is the current way to "try and run a program" du jour ?) Also, is running your "hello world" still going to be incredibly slow, or has something changed in the core system (I kno…

10+ years ago Clojure had a fantastic introductory experience. lein new and away you go. lein was so good and effective, for both tiny hello world projects and real production apps. The experience has gotten worse and worse now for a decade. The core team have continued to take things in a worse direction (supported by a small group of fanboys) and most newcomers are now completely baffled by the tooling.

The cli/deps.edn tooling is different from Leiningen, and far, far less complicated IMO. I've written a good number of Leiningen plugins and it was always brutal to get anything to work properly, especially in combination with other plugins.

Leiningen attempts to be everything to everyone in terms of building, testing, and packaging Clojure code. It's Clojure's version of Maven.

cli/deps.edn effectively reduces things down to a) what should be on the classpath and b) what should get executed. Working inside an IDE? You just want it to download the dependencies and build a classpath. Running nREPL? Add that to the classpath, and set the starting namespace to start nREPL. Packaging an application? Run dependencies that do that work, based on the clojure.tools.build library.

I was there myself; I used Leiningen and didn't take the time to figure out deps.edn --- until I did, saw the light, and converted all of Walmart's projects to use deps.edn, which greatly sped up our build and improved our dev experience.

Re: Why Clojure?

#88

Post by th0ma5 »

Lyngbakr wrote: post #58
cschep wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While clojure has gained (accreted) more options of ways to run things, every single one of the ways you mentioned still work! It’s extremely stable in this regard. Nothing was taken away because there is a new hotness. Sure, things were added. Why is that bad at all?

Personally, I prefer it when there is a solid default tool chain for a language rather than having to choose from one of several. That way, I know pretty much what to expect when I open any project in that language. I feel like this is one of the few places where Clojure dropped the ball and that deps.edn should've been there from the get-go.

What language ecosystem does this right?

Re: Why Clojure?

#89

Post by iLemming »

viccis wrote: post #34

I like Clojure well enough, but it feels like every single time I see it mentioned now is an write up trying to justify using it.

> justify using it

Justify using it against what? Can you name a single other language that does things better than Clojure? Not from your "point of values," but try seeing it from my position. Is there anything that can replace Clojure for me? I love the dynamism, malleability of the language - the flow; writing Clojure programs for me feels like playing a video game - it's plenty of fun. I don't get the same kicks from literally any other "mainstream-ish" language that's being used today. I like Common Lisp, but I have never had any practical, large opportunities to use it seriously, and there are things that I love in Clojure that I'm sure I'll miss in CL. I like Haskell, but it's even less practical (for me).

In my view, there isn't a single language that respects good ideas carried in Clojure and does them in a better or at least pragmatically viable fashion - I've evaluated Elixir, OCaml, Rust and some other choices. I am excited about Jank, can't wait for it to hit the first production-ready release. But today, nothing is more joyful for me to use than Clojure/Clojurescript.

Re: Why Clojure?

#90

Post by patcon »

I've worked around an open source Clojure codebase for a few years. I've grown to dislike Clojure by virtue of the culture it apparently fosters. As a community organizer in some vibrant decentralized spaces, reading articles from inside the community gives me ick feelings. There's a strange phenonemon involved when you have a diehard community that continually extols the virtues of the language, while the popularity of the language itself halves its open source marketshare every few years.

I mean, you have to try really hard to cultivate a community of people who have a deep love for something, but for some reason can't see what is actually wrong with it that drives ppl away. Passionate users are usually a boon, but apparently not for Clojure. But people somehow seem to build great companies with it. It's strange, and very specific to Clojure culture. I can't help but assume its failure to capture market is tightly tied to its leadership style and/or leader worship.

Anyhow, these are just hot-takes from the margins. I'm sure that passionate users will have something to say, or maybe downvote me.

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