FWIW I think nchurch's proposed new page is very nice and I disagree with almost all of jonathan.watmough's critiques.
I won't rebut them all systematically, but one top-level issue is that I think that a reasonable getting-started path should include an editor with at least minimal language-aware editing features (bracket matching and auto-re-indenting) and that it should not require elaborate setup/config steps or prior understanding of JVM concepts. By this measure I think that clooj is a great starting point (with a great name!), and that a getting started page that suggests clooj as a first step while also directing people to more sophisticated approaches would be a great service to the community. I do agree that clooj could still be improved. For example, it's unfortunate that clooj's repl currently separates input and output into two unlabeled panes, and I'd love to see either labels or a more normal input+output repl pane. But all-in-all I think clooj is the best currently available option for newcomers and that it'll be even better soon since it is new and under active development. I'm not one of the developers but I've been making lots of suggestions, which have been acted on promptly and intelligently, and I plan to teach with it starting next week. I'm also using a combination of clooj and lein for my own work, and at least for my purposes this seems to provide everything that I need with minimal hassles. -Lee On Sep 2, 2011, at 8:27 PM, jonathan.watmo...@gmail.com wrote: > Is there any reason why the 'Getting Started' shouldn't essentially > follow > the form: > > 1. Download clojure and unzip > 2. Move to the folder and type 'java -cp clojure.jar clojure.main' in > a terminal > > For the sake of testing your new page, I downloaded clooj (ugly ugly > name) > and ran it. On trying to create a project, the first question after > specifying > a project folder was: > > Please enter a fully-qualified namespace > [ ] > > huh? This is hardly the kind of thing that's conducive to playing > about happily > discovering functional programming. Can I have multiple prompts in > clooj? Can > I easily pull in clojure files. Where do I specify other jars? > Classpath? > > There's a huge set of advantages to starting in a terminal: > > 1. You can *see* the line that starts Clojure. If something's broken, > you have > a starting point. > 2. You can easily add jars. > 3. You can start multiple terminal windows to try different things. > 4. You can use your preferred editors, anything from notepad+ up, > instead of > some incomplete 'IDE' [Note: without starting a project, typing in the > bottom > right window executed commands with the input and output sort of > interleaved, > but without my input shown against user=>, instead shown below it.] > > I'd suggest that having beginners to the language start off in a > terminal typing > into a REPL is absolutely the best possible thing. Packaging a > jReadline would > be smart too. > > Thanks, and I shall now go back into hibernation. > Jonathan > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Clojure" group. To post to this group, send email to clojure@googlegroups.com Note that posts from new members are moderated - please be patient with your first post. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to clojure+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/clojure?hl=en
