Lessons from Clojure for any language

The Clojure documentary dropped last week. Worth a watch if you're curious about the language's history or Rich Hickey as a person.

What originally drew me to the language was Rich's 2011 keynote, Simple Made Easy (InfoQ, YouTube). It is the most impactful talk on software development I've ever seen and I keep coming back to it. Packed with profound useful advice, it defines an objective yardstick for reliability and maintainability (witty and entertaining too!).

I don't run Clojure.
No organization I've worked at runs Clojure.

... but the concepts apply in any language. Particularly useful in Python and R, which do little to stop bad ideas. Don't get me wrong, Python and R got some great features, low barrier to entry, welcoming community, and ecosystem beyond compare, but it's that friendlyness and acceptance that lets people shoot themselves in the foot.