Would it be an idea then to add a version of Map.update! that does not require you to use a function as last parameter?
Although of course, having both a version that runs a function and a version that puts a value at the key regardless of what it is would mean that functions are basically treated ‘special’, which might be confusing.
There already is another module that has only exactly two functions: Atom, so it does not feel that weird to me to add a new module.
Another approach that might be possible, is to make sure that passing the struct update syntax: foo |> %Foo{bar: 1} would work. I think this could be done by altering the current clauses of the pipeline operator.
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While Axe seems like it solves this problem rather elegantly, I think an access sigil is too heavy a feature to be able to be added to the core language.