I'm not sure if "special language" is a particularly apt description of what Julia is. SQL is a "special" language. At any rate - a lisp-like language with llv

I'm not sure if "special language" is a particularly apt description of what Julia is. SQL is a "special" language. At any rate - a lisp-like language with llvm backend, package manager, and a (small, but not trivial) group of users writing real software - what's not to like? I (still) recommend the talk: "Julia - to lisp or not to lisp?", that gives a quick overview of some of the design choices: https://youtu.be/dK3zRXhrFZY https://youtu.be/dK3zRXhrFZY For me, I like that it has a real story trying to balance "actual integer math" (not this silly machine constrained twos-compliment hack" and "you could conceivably write a ray tracer that wasn't unusably slow" :)