Elixir Mentor

Jacob Luetzow

Welcome to the Elixir Mentor Podcast, your go-to source for All Things Elixir. This show digs into the heart of the Elixir community, featuring interviews with enthusiasts and pioneers who share their stories and innovative projects that define our ecosystem. Each episode explores groundbreaking libraries and boundary-pushing applications shaping Elixir's future. We discuss best practices, emerging trends, and the latest tools and techniques. Perfect for developers at any stage of their Elixir journey, providing insights and inspiration. Join me as we explore the world of Elixir together.

  1. 3 days ago

    Filipe Cabaço on Vitro

    Filipe Cabaço, team lead on Realtime at Supabase, returns after two years to talk about his side projects: Vitro, a browser for every AI agent with a replayable timeline of what each one did, and Ampoule, which packs an Elixir release into one file by compiling the BEAM to WebAssembly. We also get into MCP, persona testing with agents, token costs, why launching is the scary part, AI and security, and what learning and hiring look like now that agents write the code. 00:00 - Introduction 02:35 - Welcome back and ElixirConf in Chicago 05:31 - Vitro: observability for browser agents 11:01 - Persona testing with agents 13:56 - Why MCP is the right interface 16:59 - Compute off your laptop, subsidies ending 22:30 - Three AM agents and attention 24:06 - Token costs and picking models 27:47 - Side projects: doodle discs and a patio defender 33:31 - Reverse engineering bad apps with agents 37:14 - AI, hiring, and skipping university 47:07 - iHub and entrepreneur networks 49:32 - Afraid to launch your side projects 51:28 - Open source and self hosting 54:14 - Security and vibe coded leaks 57:49 - MCP auth should be SSO 59:34 - How Vitro is built: Elixir and Firecracker 1:02:48 - Market the result, not the features 1:05:51 - Tool sprawl and agent subscriptions 1:10:53 - A local AI gateway 1:14:40 - Home servers and bare metal 1:17:42 - Ampoule: Elixir anywhere via WebAssembly 1:22:48 - An Elixir mesh network on phones 1:27:32 - Cold email and deliverability 1:34:11 - Naming agents after Star Trek 1:36:39 - Why every agent needs its own browser 1:42:10 - Cloudflare's MCP and too many tools 1:44:21 - Peter Ullrich and funding the Erlang Foundation Resources Mentioned: - Vitro: https://vitro.run/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Ampoule: https://filipecabaco.github.io/ampoule/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - ex_tauri: https://github.com/filipecabaco/ex_tauri?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Burrito: https://github.com/burrito-elixir/burrito?utm_source=elixir-mentor - KinSwitch: https://kinswitch.app/?utm_source=elixir-mentor Connect with Filipe: - X: https://x.com/filipecabaco?utm_source=elixir-mentor - GitHub: https://github.com/filipecabaco?utm_source=elixir-mentor - LinkedIn: (fill in) SUPPORT ELIXIR MENTOR - Elixir Mentor: https://elixirmentor.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor #ElixirLang #MyElixirStatus #ElixirMentor

    Filipe Cabaço on Vitro

  2. 31 Oct

    Peter Ullrich on Pushin

    Peter Ullrich returns to talk about Pushin.eu, the European GitHub alternative he's building in Elixir. Five months in, it has about 700 confirmed registrations after going viral on Hacker News, and Peter walks through what's next: webhooks, managed CI on microVMs, subscriptions in January, and a plan to win universities with free self-hosting. We also get into how he builds with Codex writing and Claude reviewing, importing from GitHub with the pun CLI, bootstrapping vs VC, why Indie Courses is shutting down, and his new news podcast, Macro Mayhem. 00:00 - Introduction 01:15 - Peter returns with Pushin 03:14 - Luck, sharing ideas, and your network 06:16 - What pushed him to build a GitHub competitor 06:43 - From bad Sonnet code to Opus 4.5 11:36 - Thinking big and building something European 12:32 - Bootstrapping vs VC 16:21 - Letter to Yourself and Indie Courses 26:11 - KinSwitch rebrand and check-in safety nets 32:48 - Securing uploads with BunnyCDN 34:55 - Going viral on Hacker News 37:51 - Roadmap: webhooks and managed CI 39:35 - Pricing tiers and self-hosting 46:49 - Five months in: users and growth 49:46 - Selling to universities and governments 55:31 - Macro Mayhem and the PHP-pocalypse 59:34 - Crypto hype and The Careless People 1:11:18 - Goatmire, the most creative conference 1:17:08 - Switching from GitHub with the pun CLI 1:19:34 - Forgejo, Codeberg, and GitLab 1:21:03 - Making sites ready for AI agents 1:26:35 - Tangled and the AT Protocol 1:30:34 - Simplifying UX: mobile first and shortcuts 1:35:07 - Codex writes, Claude reviews 1:40:52 - Reviewing code from your phone 1:43:30 - Deploying with Kamal 1:46:42 - Keeping users updated with changelogs 1:55:27 - Wrap-up Resources Mentioned: - Pushin: https://pushin.eu/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Macro Mayhem: https://macromayhem.fm/?utm_source=elixir-mentor Connect with Peter: - Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/peterullrich.com?utm_source=elixir-mentor - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/pjullrich?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Website: https://peterullrich.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor Sponsors: - BEAMOps: https://beamops.co.uk/?utm_source=elixir-mentor SUPPORT ELIXIR MENTOR - Elixir Mentor: https://elixirmentor.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor #ElixirLang #MyElixirStatus #ElixirMentor

    Peter Ullrich on Pushin

  3. 16 Oct

    Nathan Hessler on ExMex and Conferences

    Nathan Hessler, organizer of ExMex and RBQ Conf, is back four weeks out from ExMex 2026 in Austin. We cover MCing Rails World, how he picks speakers and keynotes for a single track, what running a Ruby conference taught him, and the free CFP he built on Google Sheets that's turning into an agent friendly event harness. Then we get into TUIOS and agents that talk to each other, why PR review still matters, bootstrapping vs VC, and why conferences beat job boards for landing your next role. Use code MentoredFriends for $50 off your ExMex ticket (enter it in the promo code field on the site, not the checkout pop-up). 00:00 - Introduction 01:38 - MCing Rails World and introducing DHH 05:45 - Picking speakers for a single track 08:26 - What makes a great keynote 10:41 - Why he doesn't curate topics 14:01 - Four weeks out: hurry up and wait 16:14 - How RBQ Conf went 18:42 - Scheduling a single track 19:50 - Using AI for conference marketing 21:58 - Privacy and what agents can see 25:36 - A free CFP built on Google Sheets 32:30 - An agent friendly event harness 38:52 - TUIOS and agents that talk to each other 43:23 - Why PR review still matters with agents 45:03 - MCP, skills, and usage rules 51:23 - Building is the easy part 56:30 - Bootstrapping vs VC 59:01 - ExMex promo code and swag 1:06:47 - Why go to conferences 1:09:00 - Hiring, AI slop, and referrals 1:14:02 - Do conferences make money? 1:18:27 - MicroConf comes to Austin 1:23:33 - Remote work still needs in person 1:27:07 - Free community tickets Resources Mentioned: - ExMex: https://exmexconf.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - ExMex community tickets: https://exmexconf.com/community-tickets?utm_source=elixir-mentor - RBQ Conf: https://rbqconf.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - KinSwitch: https://kinswitch.app/?utm_source=elixir-mentor Connect with Nathan: - X: https://x.com/spune?utm_source=elixir-mentor - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nathanhessler/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Hessler Consulting: https://hesslerconsulting.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor Sponsors: - BEAMOps: https://beamops.co.uk/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Paraxial.io: https://paraxial.io/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Jido: https://agentjido.xyz/discord?utm_source=elixir-mentor SUPPORT ELIXIR MENTOR - Elixir Mentor: https://elixirmentor.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor #ElixirLang #MyElixirStatus #ElixirMentor

    Nathan Hessler on ExMex and Conferences

  4. 2 Oct

    Mike Hostetler on Jido v3

    Mike Hostetler, creator of Jido and ReqLLM, is back for round three. Jido 2.0 hit the top of Hacker News and took his docs server down with it, and Jido v3 betas are already on Hex. We get into agentic back pressure, why models write better declarative Elixir, why most actors don't need an LLM at all, durable workflows with Jido Flow, and the multiplayer harness he's building on OTP. Plus Grok Bots and personal agents, reverse engineering bad IoT apps, and live questions from chat. 00:00 - Introduction 02:56 - The Jido 2.0 launch and a Hacker News hug of death 06:27 - Lessons from Ralph Wiggum loops 08:51 - Why models write better Elixir 11:44 - Agentic back pressure 14:22 - Jido v3's Spark DSL 20:48 - When do you need 10,000 agents? 26:28 - Q&A: A public actor mesh? 27:59 - Actors vs agents: Jido without an LLM 30:38 - Halo 2 NPCs and classical AI 33:36 - What's new in Jido v3 35:03 - Durable workflows with Runic and Jido Flow 39:34 - Property and fuzz testing with agents 42:27 - Who's building on Jido 44:27 - Q&A: TermUI and the Jido harness 48:28 - DASP, the Durable Actor Session Protocol 50:39 - Q&A: Pods, topologies, and the signal bus 55:01 - Grok Bots, Dots, and personal agents 57:20 - Reverse engineering IoT apps with an LLM 1:06:24 - LLMDB and LLM Catalog 1:07:51 - 600 PRs a month and vibe coded PRs 1:12:12 - The Founder Playbook skills repo 1:14:37 - Teaching and community after LLMs 1:17:31 - Will AI replace engineers? 1:22:57 - A hard lesson migrating Killswitch data 1:25:01 - What's next for Jido and the harness Resources Mentioned: - Jido: https://jido.run/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Runic: https://github.com/zblanco/runic?utm_source=elixir-mentor - LLM Catalog: https://llmcatalog.dev/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Founder Playbook: https://github.com/getagentseal/founder-playbook?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Killswitch: https://killswitch.app/?utm_source=elixir-mentor Connect with Mike: - X: https://x.com/mikehostetler?utm_source=elixir-mentor - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikehostetler?utm_source=elixir-mentor Sponsors: - BEAMOps: https://beamops.co.uk/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Paraxial.io: https://paraxial.io/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Jido: https://agentjido.xyz/discord?utm_source=elixir-mentor SUPPORT ELIXIR MENTOR - Elixir Mentor: https://elixirmentor.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor #ElixirLang #MyElixirStatus #ElixirMentor

    Mike Hostetler on Jido v3

  5. 25 Sept

    Michael Lubas on the State of Security

    Michael Lubas, CEO of Paraxial.io and the first guest ever on this podcast, is back to check in on the state of security. We get into Microsoft's record Patch Tuesday, why AI keeps lowering the bar for attackers, the OpenAI sandbox escape story, and whether the AI labs are overstating the risk. Michael shares why cheap foundational checks still beat a frontier model, why small companies should skip bug bounties, and why Elixir gets no credit for its security. Plus live questions from chat. 00:00 - Introduction 02:34 - ElixirConf US and the Hex pentest talk 06:20 - Microsoft's record Patch Tuesday 13:50 - Engineers who stopped reading their code 14:54 - LLMs as offensive security engineers 17:40 - Sandbox escapes and the OpenAI incident 23:00 - Are the AI labs overstating the risk? 26:09 - The open weights debate 29:32 - Developer anxiety and the Rails World keynote 35:00 - Why it's getting worse for defenders 38:30 - Run grep before a frontier model 41:11 - Why Elixir has an edge right now 45:21 - Patch windows in the AI era 47:11 - Can a startup stop a nation state? 50:06 - Securing your Elixir app with AI 57:17 - Letting AI patch production live 1:01:38 - Learning security as a developer 1:03:42 - Why small companies should skip bug bounties 1:04:54 - Insecure MCPs and AI assistants 1:10:14 - Verifying beneficiaries in Killswitch 1:12:36 - Q&A: Simulating catastrophic events 1:13:25 - Q&A: Learning ethical hacking with AI 1:16:22 - Kids, social media, and regulation 1:23:17 - Q&A: Are garbage collected languages safer? 1:27:26 - Where to find Michael Resources Mentioned: - Securing Hex: https://paraxial.io/blog/hex-pentest?utm_source=elixir-mentor - PortSwigger Web Security Academy: https://portswigger.net/web-security?utm_source=elixir-mentor - The Web Application Hacker's Handbook (2nd ed.) - Killswitch: https://killswitch.app/?utm_source=elixir-mentor Connect with Michael: - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaellubas?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Paraxial.io on X: https://x.com/paraxialio?utm_source=elixir-mentor Sponsors: - BEAMOps: https://beamops.co.uk/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Paraxial.io: https://paraxial.io/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Jido: https://agentjido.xyz/discord?utm_source=elixir-mentor SUPPORT ELIXIR MENTOR - Elixir Mentor: https://elixirmentor.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor #ElixirLang #MyElixirStatus #ElixirMentor

    Michael Lubas on the State of Security

  6. 18 Sept

    Brice Ayres on Fractional Engineering

    Brice Ayres, founder of Axio Intelligence, on fractional engineering and what changes when one senior engineer can run a team of AI agents. Brice went from the Army and a 3.7 million follower Facebook cause to finding Elixir at Topgolf, leading engineering orgs, and going out on his own. We get into managing agents like an engineering org, whether you still need to read every line, and why Ash keeps LLMs on the rails. I share how a team of Grok Bots handles marketing, support, and QA for Killswitch, and we close with Brice's playbook for cutting cloud costs. 00:00 - Introduction 02:51 - Web dev class, the Army, and a viral nonprofit 08:38 - Finding Elixir at Topgolf 13:00 - What is fractional engineering? 16:10 - Vibe coding and why engineers still matter 24:03 - Think like an engineering manager 26:32 - Reviewing AI code, Ash, and established patterns 29:55 - Offmic, a live AI podcast producer 35:18 - Running agents like an engineering org 40:51 - Read-only agents in prod and self-healing infra 42:05 - A Polymarket bot with agent consensus 47:06 - Marketing Killswitch with Grok Bots 52:06 - Lighthouse scores and agentic browsing 56:13 - Getting found by LLMs 59:27 - Order with Surf: agentic food ordering 1:02:48 - Agent QA and local testing with K3s and Floci 1:05:40 - Data labeling, synthetic data, and edge AI 1:08:55 - Nerves, Peridio, and Avocado OS 1:11:47 - Bot traffic, analytics, and self-hosting 1:16:00 - Hardware stories and real-world edge cases 1:26:24 - When engineers ship faster than you can plan 1:29:10 - Monoliths, Postgres scaling, and ETS 1:36:40 - Where to find Brice 1:37:44 - Cutting cloud costs: logging and AZ traffic Resources Mentioned: - Axio Intelligence: https://axiointelligence.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Grok Bot: https://x.ai/news/introducing-grok-bot?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Killswitch: https://killswitch.app/?utm_source=elixir-mentor Connect with Brice: - X/Twitter: https://x.com/briceayres?utm_source=elixir-mentor - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/briceayres/?utm_source=elixir-mentor Sponsors: - BEAMOps: https://beamops.co.uk/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Paraxial.io: https://paraxial.io/?utm_source=elixir-mentor - Jido: https://agentjido.xyz/discord?utm_source=elixir-mentor SUPPORT ELIXIR MENTOR - Elixir Mentor: https://elixirmentor.com/?utm_source=elixir-mentor #ElixirLang #MyElixirStatus #ElixirMentor

    Brice Ayres on Fractional Engineering

  7. 27 Jun

    Francesco Ciulla on Winning Developer Adoption

    In this episode of the Elixir Mentor Podcast, I step a little outside the BEAM to talk with Francesco Ciulla, Head of DevRel at Zerops. Francesco came up as a Rust developer and content creator with a 300,000-subscriber YouTube channel, and we get into the problem every builder runs into: getting developers to actually adopt what you ship. Francesco shares how he went from a corporate developer role at the European Space Agency to going independent, building an audience, and publishing his own Rust book. We talk about why distribution matters as much as the work itself, how public speaking changed him, and what being a developer looks like in 2026 with AI in the mix. From there we get into developer relations directly. Francesco explains what the job actually is, why you can't advocate for a product you don't believe in, and how he builds credibility for something he didn't write. He breaks down what Zerops does as a platform, how it compares to running things on GCP, and where developers fall off between signing up and getting real value. We also cover building a brand by declaring it and not stopping, why negative comments are a sign your audience is growing, language tribalism in tech, the risks of shipping vibe-coded projects without thinking about security, and what it takes to run Elixir on Zerops. A useful conversation for anyone trying to get a tool, a project, or themselves in front of developers. Resources Mentioned: - Zerops:https://zerops.io Connect with Francesco: - X/Twitter:https://x.com/FrancescoCiull4 - Website:https://francescociulla.com Sponsors: - BEAMOps:https://beamops.co.uk - Paraxial.io:https://paraxial.io SUPPORT ELIXIR MENTOR - Elixir Mentor:https://elixirmentor.com

    Francesco Ciulla on Winning Developer Adoption

  8. 7 Jun

    Tjaco Oostdijk on Drums to Elixir

    In this episode of the Elixir Mentor Podcast, I talk with Tjaco Oostdijk, a drummer turned Elixir developer now working at DPG Media, one of the largest media companies in the Netherlands. Tjaco played drums professionally from the age of seven and has taught for 22 years, before landing in software through a music distribution company writing Ruby and eventually moving to Elixir nearly a decade ago. We get into what it takes to keep Elixir running inside a large enterprise. DPG adopted Elixir after a high-traffic Ruby service fell over at scale, and Tjaco describes the reality of working in a locked-down environment standardized on Kotlin, using Copilot with Anthropic models while waiting for Claude Code to be approved. He also talks about the colleagues who stay skeptical of AI tooling and why that skepticism can be healthy. The heart of the conversation is muziekles.app, the application Tjaco built for Dutch music teachers to run their entire teaching practice, from year-long scheduling and student accounts to homework and assignments. He explains why he deliberately keeps payments out of the product, how he thinks about onboarding teachers, and the build process using Phoenix, Ash, Claude Code, and Tidewave. We also compare notes on shipping side projects fast, multi-tenancy in Ash, and the differences between hardware and software work. If you are building with Elixir inside a company that hasn't standardized on it, or shipping a side project with AI tooling, this conversation is full of practical, hard-won lessons from someone doing both at once. Connect with Tjaco: - Website:https://drumusician.com - X / Twitter:https://x.com/drumusician - GitHub:https://github.com/drumusician - LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/tjaco-oostdijk Resources Mentioned: - muziekles.app:https://muziekles.app - Tidewave:https://tidewave.ai - Vocablo:https://vocabloapp.com - Kabisa:https://kabisa.nl Sponsors: - BEAMOps:https://beamops.co.uk - Paraxial.io:https://paraxial.io SUPPORT ELIXIR MENTOR - Elixir Mentor:https://elixirmentor.com

    Tjaco Oostdijk on Drums to Elixir
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About

Welcome to the Elixir Mentor Podcast, your go-to source for All Things Elixir. This show digs into the heart of the Elixir community, featuring interviews with enthusiasts and pioneers who share their stories and innovative projects that define our ecosystem. Each episode explores groundbreaking libraries and boundary-pushing applications shaping Elixir's future. We discuss best practices, emerging trends, and the latest tools and techniques. Perfect for developers at any stage of their Elixir journey, providing insights and inspiration. Join me as we explore the world of Elixir together.

Information

  • Creator
    Jacob Luetzow
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2026
  • Episodes
    96
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Jacob Luetzow
  • Show Website
    Elixir Mentor

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