Clojurians Log v2

I was wondering if anyone else had something to say? maybe @alexmiller

otherwise I’m just going to submit

🙂

with my reviewer hat on, I generally do not find “enumerations” to be something I rate highly

I think pitching it more towards “how does boostrapping work” would be better

Ah, thanks. Probably not the best word, no

you can still talk about the other things

I think you want to communicate to attendees that they will learn how cljs bootstrapping works

that, and also what there exists today that they can take advantage of

hence the enumeration

but as you said, I can probably talk about that without including it in the abstract

yeah

the abstract just needs to set the hook

the “main ideas” section is where you should communicate to the reviewers the specific items you plan to talk about

gotcha. mind if I ping you again to take a look at an updated version?

no, that’s fine (with the caveat that I am running Strange Loop this week so my attention to this channel will rapidly diminish as the week progresses :)

ah right. I’m brushing it up now, so shouldn’t be a problem!

@alexmiller running with this one currently

ClojureScript can compile itself! Now what?!

Recently, ClojureScript added long-due support for compiler self-hosting. Without a hard dependency on the JVM, ClojureScript can now truly follow JavaScript anywhere. Endless possibilities are on the horizon. In this talk, you'll learn how to bootstrap the ClojureScript compiler and how you can take advantage of it, today! The future is here and I'll tell you what it holds.

yes, better

and more detail in the main ideas section :)

definitely

I’m going to let it sit for a day or two before submitting

thanks for the feedback, highly appreciated!

@anmonteiro: I like it, but I'm not sure about the part "Without a hard dependency on the JVM" - I've got some idea what that means, but I'm not sure whether it refers to the original self-hosting or the recent changes. Maybe something about being able to work with ClojureScript without ever having to install Java or along those lines - I know if that was an option when I started I certainly would have been interested. Another part, maybe for the main ideas or talk content, is what you have to give up in order to use it. Either way, I hope it gets accepted as I want to see the talk.

@shaun-mahood it’s not clear to me what you mean by “original self-hosting” and “recent changes"

@anmonteiro: Hmm... my initial thought when reading the proposal was that it was related to the google closure compiler being available without Java, and the idea of doing everything without any Java. That would be the "recent changes" vs. general bootstrapped clojurescript. It might be that the term "recently" is what threw me off, since that could mean last week or last year.

@shaun-mahood ah right. so it means last year

because CLJS doesn’t (yet?) use the JS version of the GCC

Do you have another suggestion for that particular sentence?

@anmonteiro: That makes sense - maybe see if adding the date helps understandability? "In late 2015, Clojurescript..." or something like that. I might just be a weird one, my concept of time is pretty fluid and not that well pinned down (I recently followed up on a "recent" request at work that had been sitting in my email to do soon for about a year and it felt like it was only a few weeks old to me).

hrm, I had In mid-2015 in previous versions of the abstract, as you can see by the channel history

The other question I would have about the talk (which I have to keep asking myself for my proposals which are running closer to the deadline than I like) is "Who is the audience?" - experienced CLJS devs, Clojure devs, other? Not clear in the current blurb, but I don't know if it needs to be there or in the main details though.

Oh yeah, that made more sense to me when i read it and I like it better. Sample size of 1 though 🙂

hrm, I thought that was clear by the abstract

in that “you’ll learn how to bootstrap the compiler” means everyone?

because experienced devs already know or can probably easily figure out how to do it

might not be too clear, these things are hard to convey in 5 sentences

I also wonder if that has to be part of the abstract

I don't think it needs to be part of the abstract, more of a comment for you to think about. The current sentence probably works to allow people to self-select - I'm certainly interested. I find writing these proposals way harder than most things, it's really tough to find the right balance.

@shaun-mahood I have to think about the “Recently” vs “Last year” vs “In mid-2015"

I meant about the JVM sentence

not sure if that’s what you’re referring too anyway

Yeah, the JVM sentence makes complete sense when I understand the dates.

gotcha!

thanks for the feedback

No problem, hope it gets accepted.

me too 🙂

@anmonteiro: in my opinion, everything except the bootstrapping sentence is just retelling what's already in the title, or motivational filler. If i was writing that proposal, I would leave the title, which sounds good and informative, rephrase the "in this talk..." sentence (it, too, has filler phrases) and I'd have four more sentences to add informative content that would tell more about why bootstrapped clojurescript is useful (other than telling endless possibilities that are in the future that i supposedly know) :)

for example, the first two sentences just repeat the information that title already delivered effectively.

then the third is really something you could always say about anything that you really like. but are possibilities really endless, and how do we know this? if they really are, it would be much better if you picked some and impress the audience with more info on those!

the fifth is also too general. sounds like it could be a good lyrics for a song, but i think it is already implied in the title, and does not tell anything new. of course the audience expects to hear what future holds, but tell us what it is!

I hope this helps :)

@blueberry I appreciate you taking the time to pull it apart. I’ll try and justify why I chose each sentence. Keep in mind that this talk is supposedly for everyone and not just people who know what CLJS compiler bootstrapping is. 1. IMO it’s important to convey how recent this feature is, hence the first sentence. 2. the 2nd sentence clarifies that a JVM dependency is not needed, not everyone might realize that, or that now CLJS can really go where JS can go 3. I mean that possibilities are endless because it seems today that JS’s reach is endless. that was the point 4. the “in this talk” sentence really seems to me that it is expressing what I’ll teach in a concrete way. 5. so the 5th sentence might be the most general, but I want to convey that I’ll predict what’s coming in the near and the not so near future After all I kinda believe that the abstract should be motivational, just listing exactly what I am going to talk about doesn’t leave enough suspense (to my wanting) to what I’ll be delivering

@anmonteiro hey, no prob. just wanted to help 🙂

@blueberry I know, this is why I’m trying to justify my choices. I wonder if my arguments convinced you or you still maintain your position

that's the challenge with writing abstracts. if you need to convince and explain, the abstract should be improved.

the point is that you have the whole talk for that, but the abstract is something like a trailer for a blockbuster movie

if you only say "this summer, the most interesting movie is coming to town, it will be amazing....

... it is what the movie should be etc.

the audience won't be hooked

moreover, you do not need to convince only the audience, you are writing this for the reviewers, too

I partly agree with what you said. I don’t mean to dismiss your arguments because you’re just trying to be helpful, but I think that people who have misconceptions about Bootstrap CLJS or are just starting out with Clojure(Script) wouldn’t understand the intent if I refined the abstract a little

wrt. writing to the reviewers, I do have very detailed bullet points to put in the main ideas textbox 🙂

don't worry. you do not have to agree with me at all. maybe i'm completely wrong. that's what I would look for when reviewing (I don't do this for clojure conferences, but do for other publications). other reviewers may have completely different requirements.