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RailsConf 2017: Rails to Phoenix: How Elixir can level-you-up in Rails by Christian Koch Elixir has rapidly developed into a mature language with an ever-growing library of packages that excels at running web apps. And because both Elixir and Phoenix were developed by Ruby / Rails programmers, the ease with which you can learn Elixir as a Ruby developer, is much greater than many other languages. With numerous code examples, this talk will discuss how learning a functional approach to handling web requests can improve what we do every day with Rails. This talk is aimed at people who have some familiarity with Rails but no experience with Elixir is necessary.
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In the talk titled "Rails to Phoenix: How Elixir can level-you-up in Rails" at RailsConf 2017, Christian Koch introduces the Phoenix framework, highlighting its advantages for Ruby on Rails developers. Koch emphasizes that Elixir, the language behind Phoenix, allows for substantial improvements in web app development, particularly for those familiar with Rails. As he outlines the goals of his presentation, he aims to thoroughly familiarize his audience with Phoenix while discussing its underlying technologies, including Elixir, OTP, and Erlang. Key points discussed include: - **Framework Similarities**: Koch points out that both Rails and Phoenix are designed for productivity, leveraging convention over configuration. Although they share many aesthetic and structural qualities, they diverge significantly in their programming paradigms, with Phoenix being functional and Elixir-based. - **Functionality of Elixir**: Elixir's functional programming model emphasizes immutability, which means operations return new data structures instead of modifying existing ones. This approach leads to fewer side effects and more predictable code behavior. - **Advantages of Phoenix**: Koch cites that Phoenix applications, compiled for the Erlang VM, exhibit high performance, enabling them to handle immense traffic with far fewer resources than a traditional Rails stack (citing an example from Bleacher Report, which reduced server counts drastically). - **Controller and Model Comparisons**: Further exploring differences, Koch compares Rails controllers and models to their Phoenix counterparts, elaborating on how data is handled in function calls rather than objects, which simplifies the model-making process and enforces better data validation practices. - **Development Patterns**: The talk underlines the explicit nature of coding in Phoenix, where developers must define their data flows and request handling without relying on the implicit behaviors often found in Rails. This requires a shift in thinking but ultimately allows for cleaner architecture. - **Operational Stability**: Koch explains how the underlying OTP framework in Erlang contributes to fault tolerance and system stability, allowing for seamless recovery from errors. Koch concludes his presentation by encouraging Rails developers to explore Phoenix as an alternative tool, emphasizing that while Phoenix is not a replacement for Rails, it provides distinct advantages in specific scenarios. He reinforces the idea that embracing different technologies can enrich a developer's skill set, ultimately leading to better problem-solving capabilities in software development.
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