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Tour of our 250k line Clojure codebase

tech.redplanetlabs.com

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Re: Tour of our 250k line Clojure codebase

#2

Post by mping »

This is what I imagine experienced clojure developers can squeeze out of a language like clojure. I would venture that they can train a junior programmer in a couple of weeks, and make them productive very fast.

I guess they could make it work in any language but judging by the description clojure is indeed a great fit, due to the macro capabilities, flexibility and solid runtime via JVM.

Re: Tour of our 250k line Clojure codebase

#3

Post by cliftonk »

mping wrote: post #2

This is what I imagine experienced clojure developers can squeeze out of a language like clojure. I would venture that they can train a junior programmer in a couple of weeks, and make them productive very fast. I guess they could make it work in any language but judging by the description clojure is indeed a great fit, due to the macro capabilities, flexibility and solid runtime via JVM.

I've found I typically reach for clojure when i need to do something on the jvm and want a better java than java.

Re: Tour of our 250k line Clojure codebase

#4

Post by trutannus »

mping wrote: post #2

This is what I imagine experienced clojure developers can squeeze out of a language like clojure. I would venture that they can train a junior programmer in a couple of weeks, and make them productive very fast. I guess they could make it work in any language but judging by the description clojure is indeed a great fit, due to the macro capabilities, flexibility and solid runtime via JVM.

> would venture that they can train a junior programmer in a couple of weeks, and make them productive very fast

I've got some experience with functional languages, and a good amount with functional features in OO languages. Started learning Clojure this week, and was pleasantly surprised with how quickly I could get working projects up and running. Less upfront learning curve than Elixir, which was unexpected.

Re: Tour of our 250k line Clojure codebase

#5

Post by lukashrb »

cliftonk wrote: post #3
mping wrote: post #2

This is what I imagine experienced clojure developers can squeeze out of a language like clojure. I would venture that they can train a junior programmer in a couple of weeks, and make them productive very fast. I guess they could make it work in any language but judging by the description clojure is indeed a great fit, due to the macro capabilities, flexibility and solid runtime via JVM.

I've found I typically reach for clojure when i need to do something on the jvm and want a better java than java.

Interesting take since Clojure and Java are two very different languages. And unlike for example Kotlin, Clojure does not try to be a better Java than Java. But true though Clojure leverages the power of the jvm.

Re: Tour of our 250k line Clojure codebase

#6

Post by bradleybuda »

> Detecting an error when creating a record is much better than when using it later on, as during creation you have the context needed to debug the problem.

This is a great insight no matter what language or framework you're operating in. Laziness has its virtues, but invariants, validity checks, run-time type checks, etc. should all be performed as early (and often) as possible - it's much easier to debug issues when the are proximate to an object or structure being created or modified, then when that data type is being used much later.

Re: Tour of our 250k line Clojure codebase

#7

Post by forgetfulness »

cliftonk wrote: post #3
mping wrote: post #2

This is what I imagine experienced clojure developers can squeeze out of a language like clojure. I would venture that they can train a junior programmer in a couple of weeks, and make them productive very fast. I guess they could make it work in any language but judging by the description clojure is indeed a great fit, due to the macro capabilities, flexibility and solid runtime via JVM.

I've found I typically reach for clojure when i need to do something on the jvm and want a better java than java.

I think that's also why Clojure use peaked right before Java 8 was released; once Java became a better Java, and libraries started to be designed around more ergonomic APIs than wiring up objects that needed miles of stateful configuration code, the pressure that drove you out of Java and into Clojure began to diminish.

Re: Tour of our 250k line Clojure codebase

#9

Post by tmountain »

mping wrote: post #2

This is what I imagine experienced clojure developers can squeeze out of a language like clojure. I would venture that they can train a junior programmer in a couple of weeks, and make them productive very fast. I guess they could make it work in any language but judging by the description clojure is indeed a great fit, due to the macro capabilities, flexibility and solid runtime via JVM.

Yeah, it's nice to see such thoughtful adoption of language facilities clearly oriented towards creating a successful and maintainable codebase.

The Clojure team has always done a nice job expressing the rationale for specific language features, and these rationales often lean towards solving problems that system designers historically faced.

Oftentimes, I think folks think of modern languages in regard to their syntax, tooling, ergonomics, etc; however, to me, the more interesting benefit in adopting a modern language is in how its inbuilt features address design problems that earlier generation languages exposed.

For a real world example of what I'm talking about, you can google "clojure expression problem" and find compelling articles about how Clojure solves this with protocols.

Providing a toolkit for attacking categories of problems inherently gets people focused on the fact that these problems exist in the first place when they may not even recognize them otherwise, and regardless of the choice of language, it leads to better design oriented thinking in the context of larger and more complex systems.

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