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I think this article is spot on. But. I think the root cause here is that many of the tools are build by the community. Great tools cost a lot of money to build

I think this article is spot on. But. I think the root cause here is that many of the tools are build by the community. Great tools cost a lot of money to build, and you need to build the right thing at the right time, the cost needs to be spread across the comminuty. The community is growing and tools are improving. The first generation tools with all their rough edges are being replaced by simpler tools that have incorporated lessons of the first gen. Improvement is accelerating. So when the core team focuses on new features like CLJC, Spec, Transit, Transducers, Datomic, ClojureScript, they are doing things that only the core team can do. There are other more opinionated things (like frameworks) that the core team isn't suited to do, everyone's app is too different. The thing i love most about clojure is that all the pieces seem to fit together and be working towards a grander architectural vision much larger than just a language or just a database. I use Clojure not because it lets me code my java/javascript stuff a little better, but because this grander vision makes impossible things possible. The thing I am trying to build is not possible in any other ecosystem today. So I am willing to eat the many little pains described in the article, pains I feel every day, because the grand vision is so powerful, and hope that one day the little stuff will be better.

_pmf_ 10y ago
I think the author is right in his assessment that it's a community problem: the Clojure core team does not want outsiders to participate in the future of the language, but does not clearly communicate this up front. I absolutely support the right for them to do this (I'm a happy user of the non-open C# language, after all), but they should clearly state that Clojure is defined by Cognitect, not the community. Even one of the most prolific Clojure users with a tremendous track record of extremely well engineered and practically useful libraries, Zach Tellman, has been bitten by Rich Hickey's / the core team's NIH syndrome[0]. That's no way to treat the people who love your language. [0] http://dev.clojure.org/jira/browse/CLJ-1517 http://dev.clojure.org/jira/browse/CLJ-1517
- twoodfin 10y ago
  What's the problem with [0]? I am not a Clojure expert, nor have I looked in detail at the patch, but Rich's concerns about megamorphic call sites in library code sound plausible.
- btown 10y ago
  While I don't know enough about Clojure politics to weigh in on general NIH trends, this specific patch actually has a strong rationale for further debate before acceptance. http://dev.clojure.org/jira/browse/CLJ-1517?focusedCommentId=40370&page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:comment-tabpanel#comment-40370 http://dev.clojure.org/jira/browse/CLJ-1517?focusedCommentId...
- snaky 10y ago
  > but does not clearly communicate this up front Author of Clojure fork (cursive is mine) > Clojure is Rich's personal project, which he is so kind as to share with the rest of us and in in its refinement Rich chooses to accept some amount of input from us as users. I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that it took me two years to realize this https://www.arrdem.com/2016/02/22/clojarr_-_a_friendly_clojure_fork/ https://www.arrdem.com/2016/02/22/clojarr_-_a_friendly_cloju...
wmccullough 10y ago
I couldn't agree with you more. I've been wanting to learn Clojure for years now, but I'm not going to fight with an IDE for hours to do so.
- zdkl 10y ago
  1)install leiningen 2)install lighttable 3)??? 4)Clojure Edit: You really don't need an IDE for clojure. A repl and a text editor are your best friends IMO
- _halgari 10y ago
  Install IntelliJ install cursive. Done. Have a friend who as learning to program. He got Cursive going in less than 30min
- jrcii 10y ago
  I do it with vim and fireplace.vim, it took about 45 minutes to get going. Definitely worth it.
- erichmond 10y ago
  You could have had a repl going in about the time to took you to compose and write this statement. I'm not saying that to be snarky, but I'm just pointing out how quick it actually is. brew install leiningen lein repl <begin learning clojure>
- Scarbutt 10y ago
  You don't need an IDE for Clojure, IMO, huge IDEs like intellij/cursive are anti-clojure, Clojure culture encourages to write programs composed of small, modular components that can be tested individually, so mostly you keep things in your head, and if you haven't work with it in a while, is easy pick up again, Clojure doesn't need a "dot operator" to autocomplete to million of different API classes/methods. Rich Hickey makes a comparison here: https://youtu.be/VSdnJDO-xdg?t=2943 https://youtu.be/VSdnJDO-xdg?t=2943 The thing is that most Clojure users are/were heavy Java users and they feel awkward without their IDEs and also some have a big java project that hey mix with clojure.
- spacemanmatt 10y ago

_pmf_ 10y ago

I think the author is right in his assessment that it's a community problem: the Clojure core team does not want outsiders to participate in the future of the language, but does not clearly communicate this up front. I absolutely support the right for them to do this (I'm a happy user of the non-open C# language, after all), but they should clearly state that Clojure is defined by Cognitect, not the community. Even one of the most prolific Clojure users with a tremendous track record of extremely well engineered and practically useful libraries, Zach Tellman, has been bitten by Rich Hickey's / the core team's NIH syndrome[0]. That's no way to treat the people who love your language. [0] http://dev.clojure.org/jira/browse/CLJ-1517 http://dev.clojure.org/jira/browse/CLJ-1517

twoodfin 10y ago
What's the problem with [0]? I am not a Clojure expert, nor have I looked in detail at the patch, but Rich's concerns about megamorphic call sites in library code sound plausible.
btown 10y ago
While I don't know enough about Clojure politics to weigh in on general NIH trends, this specific patch actually has a strong rationale for further debate before acceptance. http://dev.clojure.org/jira/browse/CLJ-1517?focusedCommentId=40370&page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:comment-tabpanel#comment-40370 http://dev.clojure.org/jira/browse/CLJ-1517?focusedCommentId...
snaky 10y ago
> but does not clearly communicate this up front Author of Clojure fork (cursive is mine) > Clojure is Rich's personal project, which he is so kind as to share with the rest of us and in in its refinement Rich chooses to accept some amount of input from us as users. I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that it took me two years to realize this https://www.arrdem.com/2016/02/22/clojarr_-_a_friendly_clojure_fork/ https://www.arrdem.com/2016/02/22/clojarr_-_a_friendly_cloju...

wmccullough 10y ago

I couldn't agree with you more. I've been wanting to learn Clojure for years now, but I'm not going to fight with an IDE for hours to do so.

zdkl 10y ago
1)install leiningen 2)install lighttable 3)??? 4)Clojure Edit: You really don't need an IDE for clojure. A repl and a text editor are your best friends IMO
_halgari 10y ago
Install IntelliJ install cursive. Done. Have a friend who as learning to program. He got Cursive going in less than 30min
jrcii 10y ago
I do it with vim and fireplace.vim, it took about 45 minutes to get going. Definitely worth it.
erichmond 10y ago
You could have had a repl going in about the time to took you to compose and write this statement. I'm not saying that to be snarky, but I'm just pointing out how quick it actually is. brew install leiningen lein repl <begin learning clojure>
Scarbutt 10y ago
You don't need an IDE for Clojure, IMO, huge IDEs like intellij/cursive are anti-clojure, Clojure culture encourages to write programs composed of small, modular components that can be tested individually, so mostly you keep things in your head, and if you haven't work with it in a while, is easy pick up again, Clojure doesn't need a "dot operator" to autocomplete to million of different API classes/methods. Rich Hickey makes a comparison here: https://youtu.be/VSdnJDO-xdg?t=2943 https://youtu.be/VSdnJDO-xdg?t=2943 The thing is that most Clojure users are/were heavy Java users and they feel awkward without their IDEs and also some have a big java project that hey mix with clojure.
spacemanmatt 10y ago