Aleph: Transforming Asynchronous Communication in Clojure

A brief introduction to the project:

Aleph is an open-source project housed on GitHub that aims to simplify and enhance asynchronous communication in Clojure, a dynamic, general-purpose programming language. The project operates under the umbrella of clj-commons, a contributor-driven collective ensuring critical Clojure projects' continuity. With its roots in Manifold, Aleph aims to implement protocol semantics and not the wireline representations focused on serving a diverse group of developers involved in or interested in asynchronous software development.

Project Overview:

The goal of Aleph is to unburden developers from repetitive tasks related to asynchronous communication by facilitating an awareness of the protocols they use without imposing any abstraction cost. It aims to satisfy fundamental needs in Clojure's ecosystem, addressing a growing demand for non-blocking I/O operations. Targeting developers, the Aleph project opens up an assortment of possibilities including creating HTTP services, working with TCP, UDP, and WebSockets, and utilizing non-blocking stream transformations.

Project Features:

Aleph brings to the table functionalities that make it easier for developers to handle asynchronous operations. Its features primarily align with HTTP, TCP, UDP, and WebSocket servers/clients. Furthermore, Aleph supports the non-blocking handling of requests, essential for a high volume of concurrent connections. It provides a stream-based API enabling transformations like backpressure, aggregation, and batching and integrates smoothly with manifold for deferred and stream abstractions which enables usage of various asynchronous libraries without interfering with concurrency semantics.

Technology Stack:

Aleph is fundamentally built on Clojure -a robust, practical, and fast programming language with a set of useful features that are eminently practical for real-world tasks. It uses Netty, an asynchronous network communication framework designed for rapid development and scalable network applications, essentially serving as the foundation of Aleph's TCP and UDP servers. The Manifold library is also central to Aleph, acting as its backbone in providing a cohesive narrative around asynchronous programming in Clojure.

Project Structure and Architecture:

In terms of project structure, Aleph is divided into modules based on the protocols it enhances: HTTP, TCP, UDP, and WebSocket. Each module encapsulates the non-blocking and asynchronous behavior specific to that protocol. Manifold's deferred and stream abstractions are intertwined throughout Aleph, ensuring a uniform, streamlined approach to asynchronous operations.

Contribution Guidelines: