Is there big syntax differences between Clojure and Lisp

I want开发者_Python百科 to learn new language and I thought to start with Lisp. I want to know if I learn Lisp do I also know Clojure ( with minimal effort ), is there big syntax differences between Lisp and Clojure ?

There are not big syntax differences (mostly because Lisp family languages have almost no syntax), but there are certainly differences in other areas. Clojure has a lot of modern programming features particularly suited to high scalability (actors, references, etc) that are not present as such in a "classic" Lisp (such as Common Lisp).

Clojure is an active, well supported dialect of Lisp. If you want to learn a Lisp, you can't really go wrong with Clojure.

You may find more information in the answers to Which Lisp should I learn? .

90% of what you learn while studying your first Lisp will carry over to your next.

I think it's fair to say that if you learn the principles of LISP you will also know the principles of Clojure and vice-versa. They are all rooted in the same philosophy, emphasising things such as:

• Code is data. Macros are just normal functions that manipulate code.

• Use of S-expressions to represent data and code.

• The concept of a list / sequence as a fundamental structure.

• Functional programming with first-class functions.

Apart from that, there are lots of differences in syntax, libraries, runtime environments etc. The difference in my view is probably about the same as C# vs. C++ - if you know one well, then the core concepts will be familiar but there are still a lot of fundamental differences.

See this list of ways that Clojure is different from other Lisps

I'm assuming by Lisp you mean Common Lisp, since 'Lisp' itself is more of a family of languages (that includes Clojure) than a single specific language. There are some syntactical changes in that Clojure was intended to be a more modern Lisp. For instance you can create vectors with []s, maps with {}s, which are not part of Common Lisp. And of course the Java interop inevitably becomes a significant part of Clojure.

Clojure uses vectors as lambda parameters (arguments values), but you can use a macro to write versions of defun and lambda in Common lisp that will look similar . Clojure also has access to Java Object methods and fields using a period (i.e. ".") and the name of the method or field which looks like a normal function call.

(.toString 10) - will call the method toString on number 10 but .toString is not a function. if you try to check the value of .toString it throws an exception that .toString is not a defined symbol.

And also with quasi-quotation (mostly in macros) instead of using a coma for unquote as in Common lisp, Clojure use a tilde.