interesting may be it's these bits? https://github.com/technomancy/leiningen/blob/master/leiningen-core/src/leiningen/core/project.clj#L447 https://github.com/technomancy/leiningen/blob/master/leiningen-core/src/leiningen/core/project.clj#L203-L216

apparently you can also def a map in project.clj?

wow this works:

(def project '{:version "0.0.1"
               :dependencies [[org.clojure/clojure "1.10.2-rc1"]]})

Playing around with a pod resolver (downloads a pod if it's not downloaded yet). Example:

(require '[babashka.pods :as pods])

;; this will download the hsqldb pod, takes a while the first time, fast the second time
(pods/load-pod 'org.babashka/pod-babashka-hsqldb)

(require '[pod.babashka.hsqldb :as db])

(def db "jdbc:hsqldb:mem:testdb;sql.syntax_mys=true")

(db/execute! db ["create table foo ( foo int );"])

(db/execute! db ["insert into foo values (1, 2, 3);"])

(db/execute! db ["select * from foo;"])

(merry xmas btw!)