Clojure will not work. Here is why it will not work.
Based on:Programming Language Checklist
by Colin McMillen, Jason Reed, and Elly Jones.Slightly modified for clearer rant
You appear to be advocating a new:
[x] functional [ ] imperative [x] object-oriented [ ] procedural [ ] stack-based
[ ] "multi-paradigm" [x] lazy [ ] eager [ ] statically-typed [x] dynamically-typed
[x] pure [ ] impure [ ] non-hygienic [ ] visual [ ] beginner-friendly
[ ] non-programmer-friendly [x] completely incomprehensible
programming language. Your language will not work. Here is why it will not work.
You appear to believe that:
[ ] Syntax is what makes programming difficult
[x] Garbage collection is free [ ] Computers have infinite memory
[ ] Nobody really needs:
[ ] concurrency [ ] a REPL [x] debugger support [ ] IDE support [ ] I/O
[ ] to interact with code not written in your language
[ ] The entire world speaks 7-bit ASCII
[x] Scaling up to large software projects will be easy
[x] Convincing programmers to adopt a new language will be easy
[x] Convincing programmers to adopt a language-specific IDE will be easy
[ ] Programmers love writing lots of boilerplate
[ ] Specifying behaviors as "undefined" means that programmers won't rely on them
[ ] "Spooky action at a distance" makes programming more fun
Unfortunately, your language has (checked only *unfortunate features*, Clojure has tail recursion):
[ ] semicolons [ ] significant whitespace [x] macros
[x] implicit type conversion [ ] explicit casting [ ] type inference
[ ] goto [x] exceptions [ ] coroutines
[x] reflection [ ] subtyping [ ] operator overloading
[ ] algebraic datatypes [ ] recursive types [ ] polymorphic types
[ ] covariant array typing [ ] dependent types
[x] infix operators
[ ] call-by-value [ ] call-by-name [ ] call-by-reference [ ] call-cc
Unfortunately, your language lacks:
[ ] comprehensible syntax [ ] macros
[ ] implicit type conversion [ ] type inference
[ ] goto [ ] exceptions [ ] closures [ ] tail recursion [ ] coroutines
[ ] reflection [ ] subtyping [x] multiple inheritance [ ] operator overloading
[ ] algebraic datatypes [ ] recursive types [ ] polymorphic types
[ ] covariant array typing [ ] monads [ ] dependent types
[ ] infix operators [x] nested comments [x] multi-line strings [ ] regexes
[ ] call-by-value [ ] call-by-name [ ] call-by-reference [ ] call-cc
The following philosophical objections apply:
[ ] Programmers should not need to understand category theory to write "Hello, World!"
[ ] Programmers should not develop RSI from writing "Hello, World!"
[ ] The most significant program written in your language is its own compiler
[x] The most significant program written in your language isn't even its own compiler
[ ] No language spec
[x] "The implementation is the spec"
[ ] The implementation is closed-source [ ] covered by patents [ ] not owned by you
[ ] Your type system is unsound [ ] Your language cannot be unambiguously parsed
[ ] a proof of same is attached
[ ] invoking this proof crashes the compiler
[ ] The name of your language makes it impossible to find on Google
[x] Interpreted languages will never be as fast as C
[ ] Compiled languages will never be "extensible"
[ ] Writing a compiler that understands English is AI-complete
[ ] Your language relies on an optimization which has never been shown possible
[x] There are less than 100 programmers on Earth smart enough to use your language
[ ] ____________________________ takes exponential time
[ ] ____________________________ is known to be undecidable
Your implementation has the following flaws:
[x] CPUs do not work that way
[ ] RAM does not work that way
[ ] VMs do not work that way
[ ] Compilers do not work that way
[x] Compilers cannot work that way
[ ] Shift-reduce conflicts in parsing seem to be resolved using rand()
[x] You require the compiler to be present at runtime
[x] You require the language runtime to be present at compile-time
[x] Your compiler errors are completely inscrutable
[ ] Dangerous behavior is only a warning
[ ] The compiler crashes if you look at it funny
[x] The VM crashes if you look at it funny (see example below)
[ ] You don't seem to understand basic optimization techniques
[ ] You don't seem to understand basic systems programming
[ ] You don't seem to understand pointers
[ ] You don't seem to understand functions
Additionally, your marketing has the following problems:
[x] Unsupported claims of increased productivity
[ ] Unsupported claims of greater "ease of use"
[ ] Obviously rigged benchmarks
[ ] Graphics, simulation, or crypto benchmarks where your code just calls
handwritten assembly through your FFI
[ ] String-processing benchmarks where you just call PCRE
[ ] Matrix-math benchmarks where you just call BLAS
[x] Noone really believes that your language is faster than:
[x] assembly [x] C [x] FORTRAN [x] Java [x] Ruby [ ] Prolog
[ ] Rejection of orthodox programming-language theory without justification
[ ] Rejection of orthodox systems programming without justification
[ ] Rejection of orthodox algorithmic theory without justification
[ ] Rejection of basic computer science without justification
Taking the wider ecosystem into account, I would like to note that:
[ ] Your complex sample code would be one line in: _______________________
[ ] We already have an unsafe imperative language
[ ] We already have a safe imperative OO language
[ ] We already have a safe statically-typed eager functional language
[ ] You have reinvented Lisp but worse
[ ] You have reinvented Javascript but worse
[ ] You have reinvented Java but worse
[ ] You have reinvented C++ but worse
[ ] You have reinvented PHP but worse
[ ] You have reinvented PHP better, but that's still no justification
[x] You have reinvented Brainfuck but non-ironically
In conclusion, this is what I think of you:
[x] You have some interesting ideas, but this won't fly.
[ ] This is a bad language, and you should feel bad for inventing it.
[ ] Programming in this language is an adequate punishment for inventing it.
examples
"The VM crashes if you look at it funny":user=> (defmacro re2 [x] (str "a" ~x)) #'user/re2 user=> (re2 1) java.lang.IllegalStateException: Var clojure.core/unquote is unbound. (NO_SOURCE_FILE:0)(only few people on Earth understand this error and actually no one of them understands why this error is not presented by compiler while defmacro)
