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Because React is a very natural fit for a functional language of which JS really isn’t. Which is also why it is so lovely to use React from Clojurescript.

Scarbutt 8y ago
How's Clojurescript interop story? what always holds me from using these compile to JS langs is the fear that the gains you get from using a better/nicer language are completely destroyed by all the interop churn.
- lilactown 8y ago
  As someone who's done a bunch of interop in ReasonML & ClojureScript, ClojureScript interop blows ReasonML away (in terms of ease) at the language level. The current problem with ClojureScript interop is the Google Closure compiler's support for stuff on npm. I switched our team to using shadow-cljs[0] and it solved all of those problems. Would highly recommend. [0] http://shadow-cljs.org/ http://shadow-cljs.org/
  - hajile 8y ago
    What level of inter-opt? If you want to gradually convert from JS to clojurescript, it seemed like a huge amount of work.
    - lilactown 8y ago
      Ah, hmm. Using JS from CLJS is incredibly easy. Like I said, shadow-cljs solved all of our problems there. Going the other way - using code written in CLJS in JS - is another matter. This is not well supported by the ecosystem. shadow-cljs has much, much better support for this than the standard ClojureScript/closure compiler, but it doesn't hold a candle to what BuckleScript does. IME, doing a top-down transition - where you convert the top of your app to ClojureScript, that calls everything - works best. From the top, you work your way down into each feature. ReasonML, on the other hand, works better from the bottom up. Typing your whole app is hard, so you start with some small feature that then you export to JS land (since that's so much easier with BuckleScript). From the bottom, you work your way into writing more and more features in ReasonML.
  - Scarbutt 8y ago
    Ok thanks, I know this can be highly subjective but which do you prefer between the two (reason and cljs) and why?
    - lilactown 8y ago
      I really like both languages. Like, a lot. They both tick all the boxes of: 1. Immutable by default (with sane escape hatches) 2. Fully qualified namespaces 3. Functional (with sane escape hatches) 4. Good interop with host platform At the beginning of this year, my team started a green field project to replace our old system. I had the chance to steer us toward ReasonML or Clojure(Script), and we decided on Clojure. The main reasons were: 1. The number and maturity of libraries for Clojure(Script) was much higher 2. Clojure's server-side story was much better, and we needed to write a ton of services as well as client-side code 3. The ecosystem, language & tooling was much more stable for Clojure back then I think that ReasonML has a ton of great ideas, it just lacks maturity. I love the language itself, but I would not yet want to inflict it upon my team mates who have spent the last 10 years writing Java back-end services. Clojure(Script) ended up being a much better fit and I feel like I am just as productive, if not moreso, than when I was writing code in ReasonML.
- hellofunk 8y ago
  Clojure, on any platform (JVM, JS, .Net) has a fundamental language-level philosophy of easy interop with the host.
- specialp 8y ago
  Clojurescript has very easy JS interopt (clj->js), (js->clj) plus easy ways to export external js library functions. There's been nothing I can't do in CLJS.

Scarbutt 8y ago

How's Clojurescript interop story? what always holds me from using these compile to JS langs is the fear that the gains you get from using a better/nicer language are completely destroyed by all the interop churn.

lilactown 8y ago
As someone who's done a bunch of interop in ReasonML & ClojureScript, ClojureScript interop blows ReasonML away (in terms of ease) at the language level. The current problem with ClojureScript interop is the Google Closure compiler's support for stuff on npm. I switched our team to using shadow-cljs[0] and it solved all of those problems. Would highly recommend. [0] http://shadow-cljs.org/ http://shadow-cljs.org/
- hajile 8y ago
  What level of inter-opt? If you want to gradually convert from JS to clojurescript, it seemed like a huge amount of work.
  - lilactown 8y ago
    Ah, hmm. Using JS from CLJS is incredibly easy. Like I said, shadow-cljs solved all of our problems there. Going the other way - using code written in CLJS in JS - is another matter. This is not well supported by the ecosystem. shadow-cljs has much, much better support for this than the standard ClojureScript/closure compiler, but it doesn't hold a candle to what BuckleScript does. IME, doing a top-down transition - where you convert the top of your app to ClojureScript, that calls everything - works best. From the top, you work your way down into each feature. ReasonML, on the other hand, works better from the bottom up. Typing your whole app is hard, so you start with some small feature that then you export to JS land (since that's so much easier with BuckleScript). From the bottom, you work your way into writing more and more features in ReasonML.
- Scarbutt 8y ago
  Ok thanks, I know this can be highly subjective but which do you prefer between the two (reason and cljs) and why?
  - lilactown 8y ago
    I really like both languages. Like, a lot. They both tick all the boxes of: 1. Immutable by default (with sane escape hatches) 2. Fully qualified namespaces 3. Functional (with sane escape hatches) 4. Good interop with host platform At the beginning of this year, my team started a green field project to replace our old system. I had the chance to steer us toward ReasonML or Clojure(Script), and we decided on Clojure. The main reasons were: 1. The number and maturity of libraries for Clojure(Script) was much higher 2. Clojure's server-side story was much better, and we needed to write a ton of services as well as client-side code 3. The ecosystem, language & tooling was much more stable for Clojure back then I think that ReasonML has a ton of great ideas, it just lacks maturity. I love the language itself, but I would not yet want to inflict it upon my team mates who have spent the last 10 years writing Java back-end services. Clojure(Script) ended up being a much better fit and I feel like I am just as productive, if not moreso, than when I was writing code in ReasonML.
hellofunk 8y ago
Clojure, on any platform (JVM, JS, .Net) has a fundamental language-level philosophy of easy interop with the host.
specialp 8y ago
Clojurescript has very easy JS interopt (clj->js), (js->clj) plus easy ways to export external js library functions. There's been nothing I can't do in CLJS.