Jolt: Clojure Compiler Runs on Chez Scheme

As a more-or-less neutral observation (I still kind-of like the project): What I find curious - perhaps a sign of these times: After just 2-3 months in development (judging from the repo commits, obviously I have no insight into what came before), the developer already communicates Jolt as a feature-complete, polished (perhaps even mature) Clojure dialect with multiple Jolt-adapted libraries from JVM-Clojure, FFI, Fibers, already with a professional looking and marketing-focussed website, detailled documentation, nREPL support, etc. Things I wouldn’t expect so soon from a language developed (mostly?) by a single person in such an early release stage.

I don’t know how to get a feeling about the actual state of projects like this anymore, so I always remain a bit suspicious. In Clojure, there is the (Rich Hickey inspired) design philosophy of “hammock driven development”, where we don’t rush things, let them simmer while lying in the hammock, sleeping on them, taking a walk, etc. Makes me wonder if projects like this are too rushed these days without thinking things through, discussing design decisions and getting ideas from other people, letting them mature over time. This isn’t specifically about Jolt (I don’t know much about it or its creator), it just inspired the thought, especially when comparing it to projects like Jank which has been years in development, with lots of feedback from the community and Clojure core maintainers as input.