Skip to content

Instantly share code, notes, and snippets.

@digikar99
digikar99 / why-coalton-is-a-language.org
Last active May 2, 2026 00:44
An attempt at introducing Coalton to lispers without a background in ML-like languages
#+title: Coalton: Why is the interop not easier, and why might it be necessary for Coalton to be an entire language in itself?
#+begin_quote
If you came here searching for the context in which some reddit comments were written, you might want to check out [[https://gist.github.com/digikar99/b76964faf17b3a86739c001dc1b14a39/7fa82e427da23d125ab28bb800bf0a883f457c22][this previous version]] of the article.
#+end_quote
[[https://coalton-lang.github.io/post/][Several blog posts]] have been written about Coalton, about how it can be useful and what it brings to the table. However, to me, it hasn't been clear why Coalton is /the/ way to solve the problems that it does solve. Isn't a simpler solution possible without making a full embedded language, and giving users the cognitive overhead of thinking about interop between normal lisp and coalton?
I have been thinking about this for a while as one of my pasttimes, and below I'll summarize the better reasons why coalton might be the way it is. Perhaps, I couldn't se