> But how long is it going to take me to learn what your ultra-customized, macro-laden particular flavor of Lisp?
I think that the big thing to recognize about Racket is that its approach is not really to do that. It's to implement complete, well-specified domain-specific languages that live on top of Racket.
What's unique about it is that they've put a lot of thought into how to set you up for success in doing this, so that your DSL retains a high level of compatibility with the core language and other DSLs, without any particularly special effort on your part.
The other thing to keep in mind is that Lisp, particularly the Racket community, tends to favor stratified design (https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/6064). So when you think about the level of coordination involved, don't think in terms of a tangle of DSLs and macros all vying for control of the same conceptual space. Think of it in terms of layers. The goal is usually something more like a lower-friction version of the relationship between Lua and C, or Python and C++, or even TypeScript and JavaScript.
There's an online book, Beautiful Racket (https://beautifulracket.com/) that serves as a really great illustration of how it all comes together.
I think that the big thing to recognize about Racket is that its approach is not really to do that. It's to implement complete, well-specified domain-specific languages that live on top of Racket.
What's unique about it is that they've put a lot of thought into how to set you up for success in doing this, so that your DSL retains a high level of compatibility with the core language and other DSLs, without any particularly special effort on your part.
The other thing to keep in mind is that Lisp, particularly the Racket community, tends to favor stratified design (https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/6064). So when you think about the level of coordination involved, don't think in terms of a tangle of DSLs and macros all vying for control of the same conceptual space. Think of it in terms of layers. The goal is usually something more like a lower-friction version of the relationship between Lua and C, or Python and C++, or even TypeScript and JavaScript.
There's an online book, Beautiful Racket (https://beautifulracket.com/) that serves as a really great illustration of how it all comes together.