I built a tool that lets you search for Elixir functions by their
signatures - useful when you know what inputs/outputs you need but
can’t remember the function name or which module it’s in.
For example, if you want to capitalize a string, you enter:
"elixir", "ELIXIR"
and you get: String.upcase("elixir")
Try it: https://elixir-function-finder.info/
I think it could be a useful tool, but I can’t decide if AI code
assistants make it completely obsolete or not.
It’s still a work in progress. It’s inspired by a feature in Pharo (a
Smalltalk-inspired language). You can see the demo here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOuZyOKa91o&t=307s
(the relevant part is just 40 seconds at 5:07).
Limitations
- Searches Elixir (and Erlang) standard library only
- Only “safe” functions are searched and allowed as input
- No IO, messages, or “apply”
- Some reasonable Elixir syntax isn’t supported yet
The service does “eval” on user input, and while I’ve
tried to mitigate potential issues, there’s always a risk that I
failed to do so. If the service goes down unexpectedly… well, that’s
probably why.
Any feedback would be appreciated. Can you try it out and see if it
works for you?
PS: posting it here because I can’t post it in any other category.
