[didibus]

Well, what is your level of proficiency in Clojure? If it was your main language, do you think you would still struggle reading what the code does?

I've inherited code bases in different languages in the past, and generally, it's the unfamiliarity to the language that makes it harder. Especially Clojure, being so different, the unfamiliarity is even stronger.

For example, if you read the Clojure source code (https://github.com/clojure/clojure) are you similarly lost? Or when reading any random Clojure github project?

Also, is this the first time you inherit software like that? Like have you ever inherited other similarly complex piece of code in your main language? Because I have as well, and it is never easy, no matter the language and familiarity.

Not trying to attack you by the way, it may be true, but I'm trying to isolate the variable of it being written in Clojure against the rest to really get a feel of the effect Clojure has over what you are experiencing.

[dkersten]

The clojure source code is not a good example, in my opinion. Much of it is written in a subset of clojure, since it builds itself up bit by bit and much of it is highly-optimised clojure code. I consider myself very proficient in clojure, yet I struggle reading clojure cores’s code.

[mabbo]

My team is like an orphanage for legacy projects. By my last count, we have to maintain code in 8 different languages. Clojure is new to me, but I can pick up most languages (FP or otherwise) pretty quickly.

All the rest, my team has managed to decode the intent and flow.