Anarki or Racket?

Question

For a new web-baed project, one I'm doing for fun but hope to make a success, I've pretty much decided to write it in Racket or Anarki.Which one?The problem domain is Lisp-y: convenient for functional programming, and made easier with macros, DSLs and/or metaprogramming.I haven't used a proper Lisp since my programming paradigms course at Bryn Mawr many moons ago, so I don't have any strong preferences yet.Obviously either will do the job, and Anarki is built on top of Racket.Still, what are the pros and cons (pun intended) of each?

krapp · Accepted Answer

As someone who's used Anarki, and contributed to it (for better or worse,) between the two I'd have to recommend just using Racket.
All of the web stuff in Anarki just calls Racket libraries sooner or later, and Racket has better facilities for HTML and other language generation.
Anarki (IMHO) is really only good if you want a HN clone without changing much, or if you want to experiment, because it's still rough around the edges in places, documentation is spotty, and error handling is still a disaster.

feeley · Answer

I'm not sure what part of your project is web-based and what you mean by "web-based". Do you mean executing Lisp/Scheme code on the browser side or the server side? In any case you should consider Gambit Scheme that has a complete JavaScript backend. For example check out the https://try.gambitscheme.org site to see the online REPL in action.

idoh · Answer

I've tried both. While I enjoyed the setup with Anarki better (in particular using the repl to make live inspections and changes), Racket is vastly more supported by docs and the community. So if you are a CS pro and don't mind figuring out everything for yourself then Anarki is plausible, otherwise it's kinda crazy to go that way.

hawkeyedan · Answer

Just to be clear: yes, there are other Lisps.
Yes, Clojure is cool.
Yes, LFE is a thing that exists. Yes Elixir is Lisp-adjacent.
Yes, any of those would give me access to a larger ecosystem and the resources of a well used, well supported VM.
I may be an idiot (it's been said), but I'm not a stupid idiot. I've ruled each of those out for good-ish reasons.

soegaard · Answer

FWIW the source of both racket-stories.com as well as mini versions are available. https://racket-stories.com/about If you are looking for a framework, then check out Koyo.