This article is a rewrite of fikesfarm blog post, using KLIPSE to see the magic happening inside the article.

In bootstrapped ClojureScript we have macros, but they need to be defined separately from runtime code. They are typically defined in a file and loaded using require-macros or via a :require-macros spec in a namespace form.

But, what if you just want to mess around with macros at the ClojureScript REPL, like you can with Clojure?

It turns out that with bootstrapped ClojureScript, this is possible. You just need to know one weird trick that may give some deeper insight into how macros really work.

First, it is helpful to understand that macros are really just special functions that are called at compile time. (A plug for Colin Jones’s awesome book Mastering Clojure Macros: he covers this topic in a sidebar on page 30.)

Let’s look at the transpiled code of a macro:

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(defmacro hello [x]

  `(inc ~x))

var ret__25526__auto___22 = cljs.user.hello = (function cljs$user$hello(_AMPERSAND_form,_AMPERSAND_env,x){

  return cljs.core.sequence.call(null,cljs.core.concat.call(null,(new cljs.core.List(null,new cljs.core.Symbol("cljs.core","inc","cljs.core/inc",(-879172610),null),null,(1),null)),(new cljs.core.List(null,x,null,(1),null))));

});

(cljs.user.hello.cljs$lang$macro = true);

You see that the JavaScript function emitted for the macro has the _AMPERSAND_form and _AMPERSAND_env arguments associated with the &form and &env special variables.

You can actually call this function (here we are passing nil for &form and &env):

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(defmacro hello 

  [x] 

  `(inc ~x))

​

(hello nil nil 13)

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the evaluation will appear here (soon)...

It produces the code that the macro would generate. But, alas, this is treated as a regular function call, not a macro call.

Now, let’s look at the meta for this function:

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(meta #'hello)

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the evaluation will appear here (soon)...

You see that it has :macro set to true. But, what you really want is for this function to be treated as the macro it truly is.

The trick, at least in bootstrapped ClojureScript like KLIPSE, is to define this function in a macro namespace by employing the internal compiler suffix $macros.

This, of course, depends on implementation details of the ClojureScript compiler, and you certainly shouldn’t use this for production code. But, we are really just doing this for fun and to learn. The following works in bootstrapped ClojureScript REPLs. I’ve tried it in: ClojureScript.net, Replete, Planck and of course KLIPSE.

Let’s define hello as a macro in the foo.core$macros namespace.

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(ns foo.core$macros)

​

(defmacro hello 

  [x]

  (prn "form: " &form)

  `(inc ~x))

​

(foo.core/hello 12)

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the evaluation will appear here (soon)...

Notice that to call hello as a macro, you must refer to its symbol in the non-macro foo.core namespace.

And it works! We were even able to print out &form, just for fun: open the browser console and you’ll see the value of &form.

This is cool for two reasons, IMHO:

1. It gives you a little insight into how macros work. (They are truly just functions that are given special treatment at compile time.)
2. This trick provides a way to quickly iterate with ideas about macros at a REPL (e.g. KLIPSE), especially when you can’t easily edit source (say, when using ClojureScript.net or Replete).

Have fun!