I got an Elixir book for Christmas, the one by Dave Thomas.

If you’re anything like me (and I know I am), you get a little excited when someone puts a fresh twist on Erlang.

It’s a bit different from Erlang, in a lot of ways. Not in bad ways; you don’t seem to lose much, and you do seem to gain quite a bit. Here are just a few things I’ve noticed:

Variables are lowercase, atoms have :colons

This is probably the first thing you get used to. It’s real minor. I don’t mind UppercaseVariables, but I don’t mind lowercase ones, either!

Eshell V7.2.1  (abort with ^G)
1> Name = "Alec".
"Alec"
2> {ok, Name}.
{ok,"Alec"}

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> name = "Alec"
"Alec"
iex(2)> {:ok, name}
{:ok, "Alec"}

Trailing commas are :ok

How can you not like these? It’s right in line with simplifying the somewhat overkill Erlang punctuation (so much ; and .!).

Eshell V7.2.1  (abort with ^G)
1> [1, 2, 3, ].
* 1: syntax error before: ']'
1>

🙁

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> [1, 2, 3, ]
[1, 2, 3]
iex(2)>

😀

Perl-ish anonymous functions

Okay, it’s not just Perl that’s got these; Clojure has something very similar. These help keep code short (and under 80 columns).

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> Enum.map([1, 2, 3], fn n -> n * n end)
[1, 4, 9]
iex(2)> Enum.map([1, 2, 3], &(&1 * &1))  
[1, 4, 9]

Anonymous functions are called like .(...)

This is a bit unintuitive, but it’s in some way a feature.

Eshell V7.2.1  (abort with ^G)
1> (fun (N) -> N*N end)(5).
25
2> Square = fun (N) -> N*N end.
#Fun<erl_eval.6.54118792>
3> Square(5).
25

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> &(&1*&1).(5)
#Function<6.54118792/1 in :erl_eval.expr/5>
iex(2)> square = &(&1*&1)
#Function<6.54118792/1 in :erl_eval.expr/5>
iex(3)> square(5)
** (CompileError) iex:3: undefined function square/1

iex(3)> square.(5)
25

I say it’s a feature because it actually distinguishes variables holding anonymous functions from named functions. It’s a bit like the difference between Lisp-1’s and Lisp-2’s: names of variables holding anonymous functions are in a separate namespace from named functions. You don’t have to worry about shadowing a named function with a variable.

Of course, it’s the exact same thing in Erlang, but the capitalized variables make it impossible to mix up two different functions like Self and self. So the .(...) syntax lets you use lowercase variables without aliasing the already-lowercase functions.

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> self()  # self/0 is a built-in function
#PID<0.57.0>
iex(2)> self = fn -> "hello, this is computer" end                 
#Function<20.54118792/0 in :erl_eval.expr/5>
iex(3)> self.()  # call my anonymous version
"hello, this is computer"
iex(4)> self()   # call the built-in version
#PID<0.57.0>

Elixir does use UppercaseNames, but they’re not for variables or functions (they’re for Modules, Protocols, Records, Behaviours, ..). (The book calls this BumpyCase – honestly, what a silly name. I’ve always heard it called CamelCase, but I guess I’ve just been under a rock.)

Function literals are a bit different

I really do like that arity is more or less part of a function’s name. Elixir doesn’t change that; it just replaces the fun out front with an &. (there’s plenty of fun to go around…)

Eshell V7.2.1  (abort with ^G)
1> PassItHello = fun (Fn) -> Fn("hello\n") end.
#Fun<erl_eval.6.54118792>
2> PassItHello(fun io:put_chars/1).
hello
ok

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> pass_it_hello = fn fun -> fun.("hello\n") end
#Function<6.54118792/1 in :erl_eval.expr/5>
iex(2)> pass_it_hello.(&IO.write/1)
hello
:ok

Bitstring syntax is a little different

Binaries (segments of bytes) are pretty much the same:

Eshell V7.2.1  (abort with ^G)
1> << 69, 114, 108, 97, 110, 103 >>.
<<"Erlang">>

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> << 69, 108, 105, 120, 105, 114 >>
"Elixir"

What’s different is bitstrings (segments of non-8-bits-wide bitstrings):

Eshell V7.2.1  (abort with ^G)
1> << 6:4, 15:4, 6:4, 11:4 >>.
<<"ok">>

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> << 6::size(4), 15::size(4), 6::size(4), 11::size(4) >>
"ok"

Ok by me.

Less than or equals to

I really don’t mind how Erlang does this, but Elixir behaves more like, well, every other language I’ve ever used.

Eshell V7.2.1  (abort with ^G)
1> 3 =< 4.
true

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> 3 <= 4
true
iex(2)> 3 =< 4
** (SyntaxError) iex:2: syntax error before: '<'

Paren-less function calls

Elixir is a bit like CoffeeScript-for-Erlang. That analogy isn’t perfect, but it’s true.

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> max 3, 4
4

Elixir modules are separate from Erlang modules

It’s nice to know all the Erlang functions are still there for you to use. The interop syntax is really convenient; you can’t complain.

Eshell V7.2.1  (abort with ^G)
1> math:pi().
3.141592653589793

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> :math.pi()
3.141592653589793

String interpolation

Pretty much CoffeeScript.

Eshell V7.2.1  (abort with ^G)
1> io_lib:format("The golden ratio is ~p~n", [(1+math:sqrt(5))/2]).
[84,104,101,32,103,111,108,100,101,110,32,114,97,116,105,
 111,32,105,115,32,"1.618033988749895","\n"]
2> lists:flatten(io_lib:format("The golden ratio is ~p~n", [(1+math:sqrt(5))/2])).
"The golden ratio is 1.618033988749895\n"

The flatten isn’t really necessary; I just wanted a string for a proper comparison. Erlang prints deep lists just fine, they’re just weird to look at.

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> "The golden ratio is #{(1+:math.sqrt(5))/2}\n"
"The golden ratio is 1.618033988749895\n"

Brace-less objects

Okay, these aren’t objects per se, but really keyword lists (and they use brackets, not braces). If you write them as literals, you need the brackets. If you squint, this syntax is a lot like CoffeeScript.

Keyword lists don’t need brackets if they’re the last thing in a list of values (even if they’re the only thing; it’s where a list is expected). Notably, this includes function calls & definitions. They look like keyword arguments to the function, but they’re actually just regular tuples in a list that’s passed last.

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> benji = [{:name, "Benji"}, {:age, 5}]
[name: "Benji", age: 5]
iex(2)> phoebe = [name: "Phoebe", age: 9]
[name: "Phoebe", age: 9]
iex(3)> print_dog = fn dog -> "#{dog[:name]} is #{dog[:age]} years old" end
#Function<6.54118792/1 in :erl_eval.expr/5>
iex(4)> print_dog.( [name: "Benji", age: 5] )  # you can leave the brackets in
"Benji is 5 years old"
iex(5)> print_dog.( name: "Phoebe", age: 9 )   # or leave them out
"Phoebe is 9 years old"

There’s nothing like this in Erlang; you would just write [{name, "Benji"}, {age, 5}], like on the first line. Erlang is like black coffee when it comes to syntax sugar.

This works on function definitions, too; just specify multiple clauses in a single definition:

Interactive Elixir (1.2.0) - press Ctrl+C to exit (type h() ENTER for help)
iex(1)> greet = fn name, coming: true -> "hello, #{name}";
...(1)>            name, going: true -> "goodbye, #{name}";
...(1)>            name, coming: true, going: true -> "hi & bye, #{name}" end
#Function<12.54118792/2 in :erl_eval.expr/5>
iex(2)> greet.( "Alec", coming: true )
"hello, Alec"
iex(3)> greet.( "Alec", going: true )
"goodbye, Alec"
iex(4)> greet.( "Alec", coming: true, going: true )
"hi & bye, Alec"

Finis

There’s more to come, probably, but I want to get back to reading. Happy hacking!