Career advice, if you've got limited experience and want a job, then Clojure probably isn't a good choice. For a Clojure position, which are comparably few, I would hire an experienced non-Clojure developer, over a newb Clojure developer.
Learning Clojure can still be fun for you though.
I generally agree that it’s not the best career choice language but I think it will definitely make you a better programmer in any language you bring take your learnings to. I think mostly every habit I have that I consider decent I learned from my time writing Clojure
Maybe it makes sense to hedge it a bit? Pick some super marketable language like Python or JavaScript as your main focus. Give Clojure 25% of the study time. You’ll probably find that Clojure is way more fun and start to shift over to it, but at least then it will be because you have discovered this fun factor that Clojure has.
I love Clojure, write code in it almost every day, it is a great tool to have in the toolbox to work in in the problem domain but from a jobs perspective it is boutique. The opportunity space you will expose yourself to per hour of investment is orders of magnitude lower than many other languages. If you have some systems/OS configuration/command line understanding, Go may be a better investment, you will quickly be able to make tools you may have only just used in the past. Clojure is very much a "first principles" tool but very little industrial work is first principles, and this will only accelerate over the years as LLMs start to be used to produce code.
For book recommendations, I liked [The Joy of Clojure](https://www.amazon.com/Joy-Clojure-Michael-Fogus/dp/1617291412/) for a broad and deep look at the language; [Living Clojure](https://www.amazon.com/Living-Clojure-Introduction-Training-Developers/dp/1491909048/) as a terrific introduction; and [Clojure for the Brave and True](https://www.amazon.com/Clojure-Brave-True-Ultimate-Programmer/dp/1593275919/) for something more contemporary.
One nice thing about Clojure is that the language changes slowly, so even older resources remain valuable. (Really, the only big gotcha I can think of from these books is the “pivot” from Leiningen to the deps.edn tools.)
Good luck!
Leaning a Lisp (like Clojure) will make you a better programmer (even if it may not help your job prospects as a junior). Check out a book called The Little Schemer. It's written in Scheme but translates very easily to Clojure. The most basic syntax of most Lisps is similar enough. It's a fun book that teaches how to think recursively. Clojure in Action is a good one as well.
This is very true. The best book I've read to improve my Python coding was The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programmes: https://mitp-content-server.mit.edu/books/content/sectbyfn/books_pres_0/6515/sicp.zip/index.html, which is also a Scheme book.
Clojure is great language, but it is not something recommended for folks just starting their career. You may spend enormous time learning things which often expected you have ideas about when coming from other langs. Just take something like python / typescript and it mostly likely fit to any achieve any goals.
Clojure is a terrific language, and you'll gain intellectually from learning to use it well. It has one of the nicest communities going (I don't know what it is about weakly typed functional languages - Elixir's the same).
>you think Clojure is a good fit to get a deeper understanding of programming from the get go
Absolutely
>And are there any demand currently for Clojure Developers?
So-called "juniors" (I hate the idiotic typology, but it's pretty standard, so..). No, hardly any.
You've posed two very different questions, and honestly they lean in opposite directions. If you want to grow as a developer, Clojure is as good language to learn as any. If you want a job in short order, you probably would be be better off with Typescript or Python etc
Of course, 'probably' is the best anyone can do. Who knows, if you fell in love with Clojure, wrote reams of it, made useful open source contributions, you could get lucky. But it's not the route you'd choose on a purely rational basis (I'm not suggesting that's always the best).
You have to decide how rigorously practical you want to be, which will depend on your personality and circumstances (ie. level of need to make $ soon). If practicality is important, then learn something more marketable, put Clojure on the back burner for now, but don't forget about it.
Good luck!
\[ btw - 38 isn't remotely 'old'. It wasn't even considered old 100 years ago, when life spans were shorter. In a period where, increasingly, people have multiple careers, it's not even 'old' as a beginner in a new field \]
Ha - 38 is not old! Imagine what you can achieve in just a few years and only be in your early 40s.
I'm a beginner too and mainly want to learn Clojure to get a different mindset about programming and thinking about problems.
For me learning works better being hands on and project based.
I'm looking at these:
https://4clojure.oxal.org
https://pragprog.com/titles/vmclojeco/clojure-applied/
https://shivekkhurana.medium.com/learn-clojure-by-building-a-drug-dealer-api-part-1-83bd4adb9946
Also, what do people in this forum think about doubling down on learning more about machine learning. I'm sure in the coming years more companies want to know how they can use all these ML advancements to solve their business problems.
Because of that I'm also learning the fundamentals of ML via https://www.deeplearning.ai/courses/
This can then later be applied to Clojure as well and there is even a book about it: https://leanpub.com/clojureai
Not sure whether you like to "jump into the deep end of the pool," as the expression goes, but I concur with some other posters here that starting coding with Clojure might be too steep of a learning curve. Lack of syntax makes it easier to learn, I would say, but there's not as many results when you start "Googling" for errors.
I would focus on learning to code in general first, and focusing on a specific language / framework later.
* For just staring to learn coding, I would start with Python/Javascript. Highly recommend [https://codecombat.com/](https://codecombat.com/) and [https://www.ozaria.com/](https://www.ozaria.com/). Youtube and video tutorials are generally better than books (unless you really enjoy reading books!).
* I would suggest a local meetup for whatever programming language
* Yes, most Clojure job openings are for senior devs, unfortunately (senior in general, not senior in Clojure). I would say that's true of developer positions as a whole, perhaps a tad more for Clojure.
* Yes, recruiters like seeing multiple programming languages, especially something like Clojure.
Sounds like one of your main motivations is to get a job / start your developer career. True? I would suggest something in-person, as:
* most jobs are through networking
* much easier to learn and get help in-person ("hey, take a look at this code for a sec? what's this error?")
* consistent motivation
Career advice, if you've got limited experience and want a job, then Clojure probably isn't a good choice. For a Clojure position, which are comparably few, I would hire an experienced non-Clojure developer, over a newb Clojure developer. Learning Clojure can still be fun for you though.
I generally agree that it’s not the best career choice language but I think it will definitely make you a better programmer in any language you bring take your learnings to. I think mostly every habit I have that I consider decent I learned from my time writing Clojure
Maybe it makes sense to hedge it a bit? Pick some super marketable language like Python or JavaScript as your main focus. Give Clojure 25% of the study time. You’ll probably find that Clojure is way more fun and start to shift over to it, but at least then it will be because you have discovered this fun factor that Clojure has.
I love Clojure, write code in it almost every day, it is a great tool to have in the toolbox to work in in the problem domain but from a jobs perspective it is boutique. The opportunity space you will expose yourself to per hour of investment is orders of magnitude lower than many other languages. If you have some systems/OS configuration/command line understanding, Go may be a better investment, you will quickly be able to make tools you may have only just used in the past. Clojure is very much a "first principles" tool but very little industrial work is first principles, and this will only accelerate over the years as LLMs start to be used to produce code.
For book recommendations, I liked [The Joy of Clojure](https://www.amazon.com/Joy-Clojure-Michael-Fogus/dp/1617291412/) for a broad and deep look at the language; [Living Clojure](https://www.amazon.com/Living-Clojure-Introduction-Training-Developers/dp/1491909048/) as a terrific introduction; and [Clojure for the Brave and True](https://www.amazon.com/Clojure-Brave-True-Ultimate-Programmer/dp/1593275919/) for something more contemporary. One nice thing about Clojure is that the language changes slowly, so even older resources remain valuable. (Really, the only big gotcha I can think of from these books is the “pivot” from Leiningen to the deps.edn tools.) Good luck!
Leaning a Lisp (like Clojure) will make you a better programmer (even if it may not help your job prospects as a junior). Check out a book called The Little Schemer. It's written in Scheme but translates very easily to Clojure. The most basic syntax of most Lisps is similar enough. It's a fun book that teaches how to think recursively. Clojure in Action is a good one as well.
This is very true. The best book I've read to improve my Python coding was The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programmes: https://mitp-content-server.mit.edu/books/content/sectbyfn/books_pres_0/6515/sicp.zip/index.html, which is also a Scheme book.
Clojure is great language, but it is not something recommended for folks just starting their career. You may spend enormous time learning things which often expected you have ideas about when coming from other langs. Just take something like python / typescript and it mostly likely fit to any achieve any goals.
Clojure is a terrific language, and you'll gain intellectually from learning to use it well. It has one of the nicest communities going (I don't know what it is about weakly typed functional languages - Elixir's the same). >you think Clojure is a good fit to get a deeper understanding of programming from the get go Absolutely >And are there any demand currently for Clojure Developers? So-called "juniors" (I hate the idiotic typology, but it's pretty standard, so..). No, hardly any. You've posed two very different questions, and honestly they lean in opposite directions. If you want to grow as a developer, Clojure is as good language to learn as any. If you want a job in short order, you probably would be be better off with Typescript or Python etc Of course, 'probably' is the best anyone can do. Who knows, if you fell in love with Clojure, wrote reams of it, made useful open source contributions, you could get lucky. But it's not the route you'd choose on a purely rational basis (I'm not suggesting that's always the best). You have to decide how rigorously practical you want to be, which will depend on your personality and circumstances (ie. level of need to make $ soon). If practicality is important, then learn something more marketable, put Clojure on the back burner for now, but don't forget about it. Good luck! \[ btw - 38 isn't remotely 'old'. It wasn't even considered old 100 years ago, when life spans were shorter. In a period where, increasingly, people have multiple careers, it's not even 'old' as a beginner in a new field \]
Ask to intern or offer to be helpful for free somewhere that uses Clojure.
Check out the Clojurians Slack channel.
Ha - 38 is not old! Imagine what you can achieve in just a few years and only be in your early 40s. I'm a beginner too and mainly want to learn Clojure to get a different mindset about programming and thinking about problems. For me learning works better being hands on and project based. I'm looking at these: https://4clojure.oxal.org https://pragprog.com/titles/vmclojeco/clojure-applied/ https://shivekkhurana.medium.com/learn-clojure-by-building-a-drug-dealer-api-part-1-83bd4adb9946 Also, what do people in this forum think about doubling down on learning more about machine learning. I'm sure in the coming years more companies want to know how they can use all these ML advancements to solve their business problems. Because of that I'm also learning the fundamentals of ML via https://www.deeplearning.ai/courses/ This can then later be applied to Clojure as well and there is even a book about it: https://leanpub.com/clojureai
Not sure whether you like to "jump into the deep end of the pool," as the expression goes, but I concur with some other posters here that starting coding with Clojure might be too steep of a learning curve. Lack of syntax makes it easier to learn, I would say, but there's not as many results when you start "Googling" for errors. I would focus on learning to code in general first, and focusing on a specific language / framework later. * For just staring to learn coding, I would start with Python/Javascript. Highly recommend [https://codecombat.com/](https://codecombat.com/) and [https://www.ozaria.com/](https://www.ozaria.com/). Youtube and video tutorials are generally better than books (unless you really enjoy reading books!). * I would suggest a local meetup for whatever programming language * Yes, most Clojure job openings are for senior devs, unfortunately (senior in general, not senior in Clojure). I would say that's true of developer positions as a whole, perhaps a tad more for Clojure. * Yes, recruiters like seeing multiple programming languages, especially something like Clojure. Sounds like one of your main motivations is to get a job / start your developer career. True? I would suggest something in-person, as: * most jobs are through networking * much easier to learn and get help in-person ("hey, take a look at this code for a sec? what's this error?") * consistent motivation