jank is off to a great start in 2026

jank, a Clojure dialect targeting native code via LLVM/Clang, has reached alpha status and made significant progress in early 2026. Key highlights include: an official jank book for learning the language, resolution of garbage collection bugs, workarounds for LLVM 22 performance regressions (startup time ballooned from 1s to 76s on Linux), a new nREPL server written in jank itself (tested with NeoVim/Conjure and Emacs/CIDER), and major C++ interop improvements including referred globals in ns macros, native loop bindings, unsafe casting, a type/value DSL for complex C++ types, and typed C++ exception catching. Additional improvements include deferred JIT compilation, an updated object model, and multi-threading support via clojure.core/future. Q2 2026 will focus on performance benchmarking and optimization.