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I love clojure, and dream of the day I can work with it. But do you know why more people get into ruby or js? It's community is beginner friendly. Most texts o

by fdsary 12y ago

I love clojure, and dream of the day I can work with it. But do you know why more people get into ruby or js? It's community is beginner friendly. Most texts on the subject of lisps feel like wannabe dissertations, preferably with the Computer Modern font and 5 pages long.

erichmond 12y ago
These links seem pretty beginner friendly to me. http://tryclj.com/ http://tryclj.com/ http://www.braveclojure.com/ http://www.braveclojure.com/ http://aphyr.com/posts/301-clojure-from-the-ground-up-welcome http://aphyr.com/posts/301-clojure-from-the-ground-up-welcom... http://clojurekoans.com/ http://clojurekoans.com/ http://www.4clojure.com/ http://www.4clojure.com/
oinksoft 12y ago
I would never suggest a programmer learn Clojure as their first language, because of the enormous Java stacktraces. Then there's the setup involved (Java, usually Leiningen) to get to "Hello, World" compared to Python or Ruby. Just too many places where the student can get seriously stuck. Clojure's strengths (immutable structures, expression freedom, macros, Java interop, JVM) are not relevant to the new programmer.
- raspasov 12y ago
  Yes, the Java stack traces are probably the worst "ugly" thing in Clojure but from my experience the simplicity of syntax (not to be confused with familiarity, familiar != simple) makes it much easier for someone who's never programmed before to start writing Clojure code vs many other languages where there's a lot of syntax to that you simply need to "know" to get going. Also, on a more advanced note, I've used https://github.com/ptaoussanis/timbre https://github.com/ptaoussanis/timbre with great success to get nicely formatted and colored Clojure errors and stack traces.
akurilin 12y ago
Doesn't have to be just a dream, check out HN's Who's Hiring for September, plenty of opportunities to have your everyday work be in Clojure out there, including our company.

by fdsary 12y ago

erichmond 12y ago

These links seem pretty beginner friendly to me. http://tryclj.com/ http://tryclj.com/ http://www.braveclojure.com/ http://www.braveclojure.com/ http://aphyr.com/posts/301-clojure-from-the-ground-up-welcome http://aphyr.com/posts/301-clojure-from-the-ground-up-welcom... http://clojurekoans.com/ http://clojurekoans.com/ http://www.4clojure.com/ http://www.4clojure.com/

oinksoft 12y ago

I would never suggest a programmer learn Clojure as their first language, because of the enormous Java stacktraces. Then there's the setup involved (Java, usually Leiningen) to get to "Hello, World" compared to Python or Ruby. Just too many places where the student can get seriously stuck. Clojure's strengths (immutable structures, expression freedom, macros, Java interop, JVM) are not relevant to the new programmer.

raspasov 12y ago
Yes, the Java stack traces are probably the worst "ugly" thing in Clojure but from my experience the simplicity of syntax (not to be confused with familiarity, familiar != simple) makes it much easier for someone who's never programmed before to start writing Clojure code vs many other languages where there's a lot of syntax to that you simply need to "know" to get going. Also, on a more advanced note, I've used https://github.com/ptaoussanis/timbre https://github.com/ptaoussanis/timbre with great success to get nicely formatted and colored Clojure errors and stack traces.

akurilin 12y ago

Doesn't have to be just a dream, check out HN's Who's Hiring for September, plenty of opportunities to have your everyday work be in Clojure out there, including our company.