150k lines of vibe coded Elixir: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
2 months ago
- #Productivity
- #AI Coding
- #Elixir
- AI excels at coding in Elixir, especially as the codebase grows.
- Elixir's small and terse nature helps AI make fewer decisions and maintain context longer.
- Tidewave enhances Elixir development by allowing AI to access logs, databases, and documentation.
- Immutability in Elixir reduces AI's defensive coding tendencies.
- AI significantly speeds up frontend development and improves design quality.
- Git worktrees enable parallel feature development but limit to about three to avoid context switching issues.
- AI struggles with architectural decisions, often creating inconsistent or repetitive code.
- Trained on imperative languages, AI defaults to defensive coding in Elixir, requiring human correction.
- AI is ineffective at debugging OTP, async issues, and understanding Ecto sandbox in tests.
- Despite drawbacks, AI-driven coding offers massive productivity gains, with future goals to automate more of the development lifecycle.