Hi there, I’m new in the word of Erlang and Elixir. I was wondering how Elixir and Erlang deployments fits on Immutable Infrastructure pattern, I’ve been using lately Docker and Mesos/Marathon so I’m not used to modify servers with tools like Capistrano or Mina, I don’t know how tools mentioned where deal with infrastructure changes, it would be great to hear from your experience on this matter, thanks in the advance!.
ccverak
OvermindDL1
Might need a specific example to say, but the most simple case is just a rolling restart, shutdown old code (and docker image), then spool up the new version. You can always do in-place upgrades if the filesystem can be updated in the image too.
0
ccverak
So, it’s recommended to use Docker for Elixir/Erlang deployments? or is better to use OTP/Hot code swapping?
0
OvermindDL1
I use docker but I upgrade the image in-place via hot code swapping on my larger deployment since I do not want the downtime.
0
ccverak
Where can I read more about it because I’m not sure to understand how OTP/Hot code swapping and Docker play together… , sorry totally newbie here 
0
OvermindDL1
You’d just have to push the new release into the image (docker exec or whatever it is called now), then run the upgrade script.
1
alex-kovshovik
The post says Exrm is now deprecated in favor of Distillery, but Phoenix documentation still uses Exrm: http://www.phoenixframework.org/docs/advanced-deployment. Is the documentation out of date?
BTW, the seeming “go to” solution for deployment, Edeliver doesn’t look very friendly to me: the syntax of “.deliver/config” file with its callbacks like “pre_erlang_get_and_update_deps” and commands inside of them like “__sync_remote” looks a bit dated.
Gatling looks promising: config files are easier to read and reason about.
0
bobbypriambodo
I believe the Phoenix team is busy preparing for the 1.3 release and will revamp the deployment docs along with updates in other sections. Exrm still does the job, though, so it’s not as if the docs is broken
Well, it’s bash after all, so it does feel dated. But I guess it is better for people familiar with ops in Linux servers. Shell scripts are quite flexible and dependency-free.
Gatling uses Elixir for its configuration so it blends nicely with the rest of the project. It also does several things more out-of-the-box than Edeliver (for example configuring nginx reverse proxy and creating init.d file). I have the impression that Edeliver focuses on “flexibility while being easy enough” while Gatling goes for “simplicity while being flexible enough,” but I might be wrong
Also, if I understand the documentation correctly (from the readme), currently there are some limitations such as it builds the release on the prod system, therefore requiring the server to have Elixir (Edeliver can use separate build host so that you don’t need the prod host(s) to have Elixir installed).
If it works for you, then great!
3
dgamidov
From Elixir Mix configuration to release configuration - Alchemy 101 Part 2 by @thomas-rc-hutchinson (Erlang Solutions)
3
