Racket was always one of my favorite Lisp / Scheme dialect, mainly because of its very rich ecosystem, you can make websites, GUIs a lot of things with very minimal effort, that and Dr Racket lets you see visually where import goes into code, and a bunch of other nice things.
Rhombus strikes to me as an interesting language in this ecosystem (which it is!) that not only gives you access to all those capabilities, but shows how powerful Racket can be for building programming languages!
That said I have not yet sat down to try it, but as they seem to be doing quick development with it, I just might have to.
I really want to like Racket? I really do, but I just never really enjoyed like I liked Python. And despite trying a bunch of other Lisps and liking them, something about Dr. Racket annoyed me. I'm not sure why.
It's "cool" and the ecosystem rules, and it's fast enough, I just never really found that I liked writing Racket or using Dr. Racket the same way I like writing Python so I never really reached for it when I was trying to do something. Indeed, from the first time I looked at Python I liked it. That was not the case with Javascript or Java or C or PHP? I don't know, I like Python and really want a practical Lisp that I can really sink my teeth into? So by all accounts I should love Racket. And yet, I don't.
That said, Rhombus looks really nice at first glance. This might be worth a sustained excursion to build something a bit more fun... I'm kind of excited about this!
Racket was my main language for personal stuff for years despite me never really liking it all that much and not able to put my finger on why. It's not even top 10 languages or top 5 lisps for me but it is just incredibly practical. I have zero passion for this language.
The way I use racket its main competitor is python. It's for when I want to accomplish something with heavy third party deps, and I have zero interest in writing the actual cool code I just need to make some libraries kiss and then use my tool. Not saying that's the case here but maybe racket just doesn't offer you much that python doesn't?
Sounds like you'd get more from just using one of the other lisps you liked, especially if there's a more specialized one that wouldn't be competing with a language you probably would prefer to use anyway. Like eg I have to deal with a lot of lua so I get my lisp rocks off with fennel.
I experimented with Rhombus some time ago (most especially with Shplait). Is there much new with Shplait? Something I remember struggling with was trying to use racket libraries in Rhombus/Shplait
The way the Rhombus / Racket community does libraries has to change. That whole package site has to change. Being a contributor on there exposes you to a steady stream of fraud garbage. There's nothing to promote the top libraries as the top libraries.
Racket was always one of my favorite Lisp / Scheme dialect, mainly because of its very rich ecosystem, you can make websites, GUIs a lot of things with very minimal effort, that and Dr Racket lets you see visually where import goes into code, and a bunch of other nice things.
Rhombus strikes to me as an interesting language in this ecosystem (which it is!) that not only gives you access to all those capabilities, but shows how powerful Racket can be for building programming languages!
That said I have not yet sat down to try it, but as they seem to be doing quick development with it, I just might have to.
The entire Rhombus repo is all Racket:
https://github.com/search?q=repo%3Aracket%2Frhombus++languag...
I really want to like Racket? I really do, but I just never really enjoyed like I liked Python. And despite trying a bunch of other Lisps and liking them, something about Dr. Racket annoyed me. I'm not sure why.
It's "cool" and the ecosystem rules, and it's fast enough, I just never really found that I liked writing Racket or using Dr. Racket the same way I like writing Python so I never really reached for it when I was trying to do something. Indeed, from the first time I looked at Python I liked it. That was not the case with Javascript or Java or C or PHP? I don't know, I like Python and really want a practical Lisp that I can really sink my teeth into? So by all accounts I should love Racket. And yet, I don't.
That said, Rhombus looks really nice at first glance. This might be worth a sustained excursion to build something a bit more fun... I'm kind of excited about this!
Racket was my main language for personal stuff for years despite me never really liking it all that much and not able to put my finger on why. It's not even top 10 languages or top 5 lisps for me but it is just incredibly practical. I have zero passion for this language.
The way I use racket its main competitor is python. It's for when I want to accomplish something with heavy third party deps, and I have zero interest in writing the actual cool code I just need to make some libraries kiss and then use my tool. Not saying that's the case here but maybe racket just doesn't offer you much that python doesn't?
Sounds like you'd get more from just using one of the other lisps you liked, especially if there's a more specialized one that wouldn't be competing with a language you probably would prefer to use anyway. Like eg I have to deal with a lot of lua so I get my lisp rocks off with fennel.
We are pleased to announce Rhombus 1.1 is now available from https://rhombus-lang.org
Rhombus is easy to use and uniquely customizable.
See https://blog.racket-lang.org/2026/08/rhombus-v1.1.html for the release announcement and highlights.
I experimented with Rhombus some time ago (most especially with Shplait). Is there much new with Shplait? Something I remember struggling with was trying to use racket libraries in Rhombus/Shplait
The way the Rhombus / Racket community does libraries has to change. That whole package site has to change. Being a contributor on there exposes you to a steady stream of fraud garbage. There's nothing to promote the top libraries as the top libraries.
https://pkgs.racket-lang.org/?fam=Rhombus
I wish they had chosen a more "modern" name for the language.
What would be a modern name for a language?
Honestly a unique searchable name is better. I type in racket and results are mixed with tennis and I need to suffix "Language"
well, i also have to type "rhombus language" to get relevant results for the rhombus language
.NET/.NET Core/.NET Framework migration is painful because of this. VS/VSCode is sometimes only possible with AI’s help.