Launch the REPL from within my app - clojure

Question

Suppose that I have implemented a few functions for some personal calculation at work. I'd like to build a .jar (uberjar) that my colleagues would use too in a REPL, like:
megacorpcalcs.core=> (+ 2 2)
4
megacorpcalcs.core=> (salary 8 0.4)
666$
What code should I type for a REPL to start when the .jar launches?

Answer 1

EDIT: after your comments I've split this answer into 2
1. Running your uberjar with a REPL
Create your uberjar, and start it with:
java -cp /path/to/your/application-X.Y.Z-standalone.jar clojure.main -i #your_application/foo.clj -r
I had to add the -i parameter and point it to one of my clj files in order to get any of my classes in the project to actually load in the repl. There may be a better way to do this, but I haven't found it yet. Without it, you get a standard clojure repl but your application isn't loaded.
Note, you need the # symbol so that it loads from the jar file relative to the classpath (i.e from root of jar).
This should start a repl which you can change namespace and run your application functions in.
Additionally, you can install rlwrap and prepend the java command with it so you can use history and arrow keys sanely.
2. Embedding a REPL server in your application to connect to from another client
You can embed your own repl on startup of your application (e.g. a simple main that just starts a repl instance), and then your users can run your jar file, and separately connect to it with their choice of tool (cider-jack-in, 'lein repl connect ...')
The simple version of this is:
(start-server :port 7890 :handler cider-nrepl-handler)
Substitute the port you want, see below for the appropriate namespaces to import.
Here is a more complete example:
(ns your-app.server
(:gen-class)
(:require [cider.nrepl :refer (cider-nrepl-handler)]
[clojure.tools.nrepl.server :refer [start-server]]))
(def repl-server (atom nil))
(defn create-nrepl-server!
[repl-port]
(println (format "starting nrepl server on port %d" repl-port))
(reset! repl-server (start-server :port repl-port :handler cider-nrepl-handler)))
(defn -main []
;; ...
(let [repl-port 7890]
(create-nrepl-server! repl-port)
(spit ".nrepl-port" repl-port)))
You'll need the following in your project.clj file
:plugins [[cider/cider-nrepl "0.10.0"]] ;; or whatever version you prefer
:dependencies [[org.clojure/tools.nrepl "0.2.12"]]
Once connected to your custom repl, standard rules apply, just change namespace and call your functions.