Elixir Wizards

In the final episode of Season 15, Charles Suggs and Emma Whamond are joined by James Gray, co-author of Designing Elixir Systems with OTP, to talk about what has changed in software development and what still holds true. Years after the book’s release, many of its core ideas around architecture, boundaries, supervision, and system design remain deeply relevant, even as AI tools reshape how developers learn, build, and collaborate.

James brings a unique perspective to the conversation: he is an experienced Elixir and OTP educator who only recently began using LLMs in his own workflow. He shares what surprised him, where the tools have been useful, where they have created risk, and what happened when Claude accidentally wiped his local development database. The conversation explores how AI can speed up parts of the work while making foundational knowledge, code review, testing, and clear system boundaries even more important.

To close the season, James and the hosts reflect on what developers should hold onto as the stack continues to shift. They discuss responsible LLM usage, the changing role of pair programming, who owns the mental model when AI helps write code, and why Elixir’s long-standing strengths may matter even more in an AI-assisted development world.

James is scheduled to speak at ElixirConf 2026, September 10–11 in Chicago, and the Elixir Wizards will be there too! Join us and the broader Elixir community, and use promo code Elixirwizards for 10% off in-person or virtual tickets at https://elixirconf.com/

Key topics discussed in this episode:

James Gray’s work on Designing Elixir Systems with OTP

What still holds true in Elixir system design

Layered architecture and durable software fundamentals

Functional core, imperative shell in modern applications

Supervision trees as application lifecycle maps

Why boundaries still matter in AI-assisted development

What AI changes about learning and building software

What AI does not change about software design

James’ first month using LLMs

When Claude erased a local development database

Trust, verification, and responsible LLM usage

The risk of AI-generated boundary violations

Pair programming, mental models, and developer judgment

Ethical and legal questions around AI tools

Why OTP concepts still matter in distributed systems

How Elixir thinking applies to AI agent workflows

What developers should preserve as the stack shifts

James’ upcoming ElixirConf talk

Links mentioned:

Java Programming Language https://www.java.com/en/

Perl Programming Language https://www.perl.org/

Ruby Programming Language https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/

Best of Ruby Quiz by James Gray https://www.google.com/books/edition/Best_of_Ruby_Quiz/bMggAQAAIAAJ

Designing Elixir Systems with OTP https://pragprog.com/titles/jgotp/designing-elixir-systems-with-otp/

RubyConf talk: Boundaries by Gary Bernhardt https://youtu.be/yTkzNHF6rMs

Book: Real-World Event Sourcing by Kevin Hoffman https://pragprog.com/titles/khpes/real-world-event-sourcing/

Broadway Library https://elixir-broadway.org/

Supervision Trees https://elixir.hexdocs.pm/supervisor-and-application.html

PostgreSQL https://www.postgresql.org/

ClickHouse https://clickhouse.com/

GenServer https://elixir.hexdocs.pm/GenServer.html

Programming as Theory Building by Peter Naur https://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~remzi/Naur.pdf

“A computer can never be held accountable, therefore a computer must never make a management decision.” – IBM Training Manual, 1979

Oban https://oban.pro/

Anthropic Claude Fable https://www.anthropic.com/claude/fable

Claude Design https://claude.com/product/design

Tidewave Agentic Dev Environment for Phoenix and Rails https://tidewave.ai/

2x – nine months later: We did it https://ideas.fin.ai/p/2x-nine-months-later

James Gray’s Blog https://programmersstone.blog/about/

ElixirConf https://elixirconf.com/

ExMex https://exmexconf.com/
Special Guest: James Gray.

In this episode of Elixir Wizards, Charles Suggs and Emma Whamond are joined by Zach Daniel, creator of the Ash Framework and Igniter, VP of Engineering at Remedy Meds, and upcoming ElixirConf keynote speaker, to talk about what sits between an LLM and useful engineering work.

Zach reflects on how much has changed since his last appearance on the podcast in October 2024, moving from Igniter, code generation, and project patching into AI agents, context layers, and custom engineering workflows. The conversation explores how deterministic tools and probabilistic LLMs can work together, and why the most useful AI systems often depend on the structure built around the model.

We also discuss why teams should be careful about outsourcing the systems that hold their organizational knowledge and decision-making. He shares his perspective on owning the AI stack, building internal knowledge systems, training junior developers in an AI-augmented world, avoiding vendor lock-in, and why Elixir may be especially well-suited for safer agentic workflows.

Zach will be a keynote speaker at ElixirConf 2026, September 10–11 in Chicago, and the Elixir Wizards will be there too! Join us and the broader Elixir community, and use promo code Elixirwizards for 10% off in-person or virtual tickets at https://elixirconf.com/

Key topics discussed in this episode:

Zach Daniel’s work with Ash, Igniter, and AI tooling

How software development has changed since 2024

Deterministic code generation vs. LLM-generated code

Combining structured tools with AI agents

What it means to own your AI stack

Organizational knowledge as an engineering “spinal column”

Context layers, documentation, and internal workflows

Building custom agentic systems

Security, vendor lock-in, and open source LLMs

Junior developers and apprenticeship in the AI era

Why Elixir and the BEAM fit agentic workflows

Links mentioned:

Ash Framework https://ash-hq.org/

Igniter https://igniter.hexdocs.pm/

Phoenix Framework https://www.phoenixframework.org/

Remedy Meds https://remedymeds.com/

Keynote: Code Generators are Dead. Long Live Code Generators - Chris McCord | ElixirConf EU 2025 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojL_VHc4gLk

https://phoenix.hexdocs.pm/Mix.Tasks.Phx.Gen.Live.html

LSP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_Server_Protocol

Claude Code https://claude.com/product/claude-code

GitHub Actions https://github.com/features/actions

Harness Engineering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_harness
Claude SDK https://code.claude.com/docs/en/agent-sdk/overview

Zach's Twitter https://x.com/ZachSDaniel1

ElixirConf https://elixirconf.com/

AshConf https://luma.com/wz4z0iz6

Goatmire https://goatmire.com/
Special Guest: Zach Daniel.

In this episode of Elixir Wizards, Charles Suggs and Emma Whamond are joined by Flora Petterson, a self-taught Elixir developer, speaker, and maker, to talk about what happens when software systems forget and how developers can design for recovery.



Flora shares her unconventional path to programming, from puppetry and creative work to discovering Elixir through Nerves and hardware projects. The conversation centers on her talk, “After the Crash,” which uses forgetting as a way to think about failure in software systems. Flora and the hosts explore process crashes, lost state, GenServer lifecycle, supervision, “let it crash,” and the difference between preventing failure and building systems that know how to recover.



The episode also expands from software memory to team memory. Flora discusses documentation, institutional knowledge, mentorship, storytelling, and the challenge of preserving both what a system does and why decisions were made. Along the way, she shares how creative, low-stakes projects can help developers build deeper technical understanding and how the Elixir community can continue supporting new and self-taught engineers.

Key topics discussed in this episode:

Learning through experimentation with Nerves, hardware, and animatronics

What it means for software systems to “forget”

Failure, recovery, and lost state in the BEAM

GenServer lifecycle and process recovery

The nuance behind “let it crash”

What supervision trees can and cannot protect

Designing systems to recover from failure

Deciding when state should be recovered or abandoned

Documentation as organizational memory

Capturing the “why” behind technical decisions

Tests, docs, and examples as living knowledge

Mentorship for self-taught and junior developers

Storytelling as technical communication

Creative projects as a path to deeper learning

AI’s impact on new developers

Community, curiosity, and growth in Elixir

Join us and the broader Elixir community at ElixirConf in Chicago this September 10-11. Use promo code Elixirwizards for 10% off in-person or virtual tickets at https://elixirconf.com/

Links mentioned:

Embedded Elixir Nerve https://nerves-project.org/

Gig City Elixir Conference https://www.gigcityelixir.com/

Strange Loop Conference https://www.thestrangeloop.com/

Elixir Wizards S15E05 The State of Code Quality with Saša Jurić http://bit.ly/EWS15E05

One Art by Elizabeth Bishop https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47536/one-art

"Systems that run forever self-heal and scale" by Joe Armstrong (2013) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNICGEwmXLU

Conway's Law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_law

Dunning–Kruger effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect

Elixir Wizards S15E10 Bruce Tate http://bit.ly/EWS15E10

Designing Elixir Systems with OTP by James Gray & Bruce Tate https://pragprog.com/titles/jgotp/designing-elixir-systems-with-otp/

GenServer Behavior https://elixir.hexdocs.pm/main/GenServer.html

IEx https://iex.hexdocs.pm/IEx.html

Domain Driven Design by Eric Evans https://www.domainlanguage.com/

GDPR General Data Protection Regulation https://gdpr-info.eu/

https://blog.cleancoder.com/uncle-bob/2017/02/23/NecessaryComments.html

Living Documentation by Cyrille Matraire https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/living-documentation-continuous/9780134689418/

Exciting ExDoc talk by Flora Petterson 2025 CodeSync https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLr9FOARwzQ

ExDoc https://ex-doc.hexdocs.pm/

The AI Coding Crisis Blog Series https://grox.io/blog/series/the-ai-coding-crisis/

Build Animatronics with Nerves talk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ulurej4NTg

Sam Aaron Sonic Pi https://sonic-pi.net/

https://scratch.mit.edu/

https://www.scratchfoundation.org/learn

Nerves LiveBook https://github.com/nerves-livebook/

Hardware for Embedded Systems https://www.raspberrypi.com/

Goatmire Conference https://goatmire.com/

In this episode, Elixir Wizards Charles Suggs and Emma Whamond are joined by Bruce Tate, founder of Groxio and longtime Elixir educator, to discuss career growth and mentorship in the age of AI.

Bruce reflects on Elixir’s evolution and explores how AI coding agents are changing the way developers learn, work, and advance. He explains his “anti-vibe coding” philosophy and recommends practices for maintaining code quality, arguing that many struggles attributed to junior developers are really failures of training and mentorship.

Rather than using AI productivity gains to eliminate entry-level roles, Bruce challenges teams to reinvest that time in educating juniors to support their long-term career path.

Bruce will expand on this conversation at ElixirConf 2026, September 10–11 in Chicago, and the Elixir Wizards will be there too! Join us and the broader Elixir community, and use promo code Elixirwizards for 10% off in-person or virtual tickets at https://elixirconf.com/

Topics discussed in this episode:

The evolution of the Elixir ecosystem from conception to now

Rethinking career growth and mentorship in the age of AI

What “anti-vibe coding” means

Functional core and imperative shell design

OTP fundamentals and architectural literacy

Managing AI-generated code and pull requests

Mentorship beyond code review

Developing engineering judgment

API design as a core skill

AI as a force multiplier for junior developers

Reinvesting AI productivity gains in people

Links mentioned:

https://grox.io/

Seven Languages in Seven Weeks by Bruce Tate https://pragprog.com/titles/btlang/seven-languages-in-seven-weeks/

Programming Phoenix LiveView https://pragprog.com/titles/liveview/programming-phoenix-liveview/

BASIC Programming Language https://www.purebasic.com/

C++ Programming Language https://cplusplus.com/

COBOL Programming Language https://www.ibm.com/think/topics/cobol

Fortran Programming Language https://fortran-lang.org/

Bitter Java by Bruce Tate https://www.amazon.com/Bitter-Java-Bruce-Tate/dp/193011043X

Slashdot Effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slashdot_effect

Slashdot https://slashdot.org/

Java Programming Language https://www.java.com/en/

Ruby Programming Language https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/

Lisp Programming Language https://lisp-lang.org/

Haskell Programming Language https://www.haskell.org/

Erlang Programming Language https://www.erlang.org/

Eric Meadows-Jönsson https://github.com/ericmj

Machine Learning in Elixir by Sean Moriarity https://pragprog.com/titles/smelixir/machine-learning-in-elixir/

The AI Collective https://www.aicollective.com/

Elixir Pipe Operator https://operator.hexdocs.pm/readme.html

Phoenix Framework https://www.phoenixframework.org/

Phoenix LiveView https://phoenix-live-view.hexdocs.pm/Phoenix.LiveView.html

Broadway https://hex.pm/packages/broadway

Designing Elixir Systems with OTP by James Edward Gray & Bruce Tate https://pragprog.com/titles/jgotp/designing-elixir-systems-with-otp/

The AI Coding Crisis Blog Series https://grox.io/blog/series/the-ai-coding-crisis/

Groxio Live https://grox.io/live
Special Guest: Bruce Tate.

In this episode of Elixir Wizards, Charles Suggs and Emma Whamond are joined by Mallory Knodel, executive director and founder of the Social Web Foundation, to talk about internet governance, open standards, and the future of the social web. Mallory shares how her work as an activist, systems administrator, and public interest technologist led her into the organizations and working groups that shape how the internet functions, including the IETF, W3C, ICANN, and ITU.

The conversation explores how the internet shifted from a collection of open protocols toward a small number of dominant platforms, and what that centralization means for users, developers, and independent service providers. Mallory explains how decisions made at the protocol level can affect everything from email deliverability to identity, data portability, trust and safety, and the ability to move between platforms. We also discuss the Social Web Foundation, ActivityPub, the Fediverse, and the idea of building a more multipolar social web.

Mallory also looks at what happens when AI agents, automated accounts, and algorithmic feeds enter open social ecosystems. She shares her perspective on privacy, usability, encrypted messaging, and designing technology around user needs rather than engagement alone.

Key Topics Discussed

What it means to be a public interest technologist

How internet governance affects everyday software development

The role of global internet standards organizations

How the IETF and W3C develop technical standards

Corporate influence inside internet governance and standards bodies

The internet’s shift from protocols to centralized platforms

Email deliverability and the hidden costs of centralization

How platform control affects identity and user autonomy

Why data portability remains difficult across social platforms

The mission behind the Social Web Foundation

How the Fediverse connects independent social platforms

ActivityPub and Activity Streams as open web protocols

AT Protocol, an alternative to ActivityPub

How federated servers exchange content and user activity

Why a multipolar web differs from decentralization

What Meta’s ActivityPub adoption means for federation

The embrace, extend, extinguish risk for open protocols

Discoverability challenges across federated social networks

Trust and safety for smaller platform operators

How protocol decisions can affect human rights

AI agents entering open social web ecosystems

Whether federated platforms should block automated crawlers

Designing algorithmic feeds around values and user choice

Privacy-first principles for developers building social software

Encrypted direct messaging for the open social web

Elixir projects building across the Fediverse ecosystem

Links Mentioned:

Mallory’s Website https://malloryknodel.net/

Internet Protocol (IP) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Protocol

Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) https://www.ietf.org/

International Communication Union https://www.itu.int/en/

Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) https://www.icann.org/

World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) https://www.w3.org/

Huawei https://www.huawei.com/en/

Cisco https://www.cisco.com/

Messaging, Malware and Mobile Anti-Abuse Working Group (M³AAWG) https://www.m3aawg.org/

Social Web Foundation https://socialwebfoundation.org/

ActivityPub https://www.w3.org/TR/activitypub/

AT Protocol https://atproto.com/

MeWe Decentralized Social Networking Protocol (DNSP) https://dsnp.org/about/MeWe-use-case.html

BlueSky https://bsky.app/

Mastodon https://joinmastodon.org/

Internet Society https://www.internetsociety.org/

Fediverse https://fediverse.party/

NCSA Mosaic Browser https://www.ncsa.illinois.edu/research/project-highlights/ncsa-mosaic/

Webring https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webring

https://tags.pub/

Elixir projects:

Pleroma https://pleroma.social/

Akkoma https://akkoma.social/

Bonfire Networks https://bonfirenetworks.org/

Mobilizon https://mobilizon.org/