How does one start a thread in Clojure?
clojure, concurrency, multithreading
Solution
Clojure `fn`s are `Runnable` so it's common to use them in exactly the way you posted, yes.
user=> (dotimes [i 10] (.start (Thread. (fn [] (println i)))))
0
1
2
4
5
3
6
7
8
9
nil
Another option is to use agents, in which case you would `send` or `send-off` and it'll use a Thread from a pool.
user=> (def a (agent 0))
#'user/a
user=> (dotimes [_ 10] (send a inc))
nil
;; ...later...
user=> @a
10
Yet another option would be `pcalls` and `pmap`. There's also `future`. They are all documented in the Clojure API.
Problem
I've read a lot about how great Clojure is when it comes to concurrency, but none of the tutorials I've read actually explain how to create a thread. Do you just do (.start (Thread. func)), or is there another way that I've missed?