MaxSvargal
Hey folks! 
I’d like to introduce AshSDUI, a new library for generating complex interfaces and dynamic layouts directly from declarative Ash resource metadata, powered by Ash and Phoenix LiveView.
I know excellent tools like AshAdmin, Backpex, and Aurora UIX already exist. However, in my experience, they often lack architectural flexibility and clear escape hatches and sometimes excessive boilerplate and low-level handling. I wanted the ability to generate nested forms easily and dynamically alter layouts straight from the database or resource code, based on the actor, tenant, or user role without cluttering templates with conditional logic, and to do so with minimal boilerplate.
With AshSDUI, I’ve focused on creating a highly compact public interface that relies on your existing resource Ash metadata and ready-to-use receipts, but remains fully extensible at any level. It’s designed as an authoring ladder: you can start with fully generated screens and step down to custom recipes or raw LiveView only when needed, all without rewriting the whole stack.
AshSDUI is useful when you want more than scaffolded CRUD, but you still want a declarative path that stays close to your Ash resource model.
- It separates metadata, view resolution, recipes, and render trees into clear layers.
- It gives humans and llm agents a smaller authoring surface through standalone UI modules.
- It keeps generated screens, custom layouts, and live runtime components on one contract.
- It can grow from generated pages into product UI without forcing a rewrite of the whole stack.
Key highlights:
- Server-Driven UI (SDUI): Dynamically resolve layouts and component compositions based on context (actor, tenant, audience, etc.) without touching the frontend templates.
- Metadata-Driven Generation: Seamlessly generate complex UI, handle deep model relationships, and build nested forms right from Ash resource descriptions (
ui_field,ui_intent, etc.). - Architectural Flexibility: Build ephemeral, code-authored, or database-persisted layout trees with clear escape hatches at every layer.
- Shared Runtime Contract: Both generated screens and custom SDUI layouts share the exact same underlying contract (
view,bindings,state, andcontext), keeping your data loading and rendering completely consistent.
You can find all the details, tutorials, and deep dives into the runtime/authoring models in the documentation here:
AshSDUI Repository and Readme
I would love to hear your feedback, thoughts, and suggestions! Thanks for your time.
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nico_amsterdam
Welcome Max.
You can update your skill set on https://maxsvargal.github.io/
MaxSvargal
Oh, it’s about 13 years old -_-
omer
Amazing work! This is exactly what the Ash ecosystem needs right now.
Ash provides absolute superpowers on the backend—handling complex domain logic, relationships, and APIs beautifully. However, the frontend has often remained a bottleneck where we lose that declarative leverage.
The concept of a true Metadata-Driven UI is an absolute game-changer for rapid application development. Having worked extensively with massive ecosystems like Odoo and Frappe, I’ve seen firsthand that their secret weapon is exactly this architecture. By allowing resource metadata to natively dictate dynamic layouts and nested forms, developers can focus entirely on business logic rather than wiring up redundant frontend templates.
Bringing this level of Server-Driven UI to Elixir—combining the declarative nature of Ash with LiveView—is a brilliant move. Your approach with the “authoring ladder” is particularly smart, providing that “batteries-included” experience for generating complex screens quickly while leaving a well-structured escape hatch for custom components.
I’m really looking forward to diving into the repo and seeing how it handles complex, high-concurrency SaaS architectures. Thank you for building and sharing this!
P.S. This really feels like the perfect answer to the previous community explorations regarding the future of Pyro and AshAdmin: https://forum.elixirforum.com/t/an-exploration-of-the-the-future-of-pyro-and-ashadmin/60827
MaxSvargal
The ultimate goal is to provide an abstract, declarative architecture that isn’t just for admin dashboards, but is equally suited for public, user-facing interfaces. As you noted with the ‘authoring ladder’, it’s all about hitting that exact sweet spot: delivering the absolute minimum boilerplate out of the box, while allowing for maximum customization on demand.
Thanks for checking it out, and I’d love to hear your thoughts once you dive into the repo!